


Mirror My Malady, Transfer My Tragedy

by hegemony



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Character of Color, Crossdressing, F/M, M/M, Pegging, Polyamory, Post-Movie(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-27
Updated: 2009-08-27
Packaged: 2017-10-20 17:21:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/215167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hegemony/pseuds/hegemony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>San Francisco turned into a story of three, Portland became a story of two, and he’s sure everything else will become a story of one. She shows him how wrong he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirror My Malady, Transfer My Tragedy

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for explicit heterosexual sex and partially explicit slash, pegging, character death, angst, and an instance of drag/crossdressing. Also, retrofitted Chuck Norris jokes and moments that dip to 'romantic comedy', and no, not in that way.  
> Title blatantly stolen from TV on the Radio’s _Wolf Like Me_. Like the title, the characters also belong to someone else.
> 
> Thank you to my Betas: Nomelon, Nextian, and Maschalismos

"You know, it just occurred to me you would love my roommate," Gaila had said, charismatic behind her tipsy smile. She bit her lip and took another drink of wine as he stares at her, unsure of the claim. “Honestly!”

Gaila had grinned, and taken another drink from her glass. "She's made of titanium, but I’d never call her…what do you Terrans call really mean women?”

“Bitches?” He had supplied. “Or, like, ice queens? Maybe a queen of the harpies?”

“Yeah, those. Uhura might be a little unexpected and frank, but she’s not any of those,” Galia had told him, pausing afterward. “What’s a harpy and why do they need royalty?”

Hikaru’s pretty sure his incredulous drunken expression told Gaila she really did not need to know.

“Look,” Gaila continued, “I just... think you'd like her. A lot."

"What do you think she'd say about me?" he asked.

"That you're smart and funny and cute.”

“Cute?”

“Enough to match her rigorous standards. You can tell a lot by the company a girl keeps," She grinned. "She's communications, so she doesn't come to stuff like these science parties, but she's really smart, and I'm sure you'll get along really well. It'll be perfect."

"Perfect," he repeated, letting the word roll on his tongue. "Hmm."

 

 

 

In the endless devastation and ruin of Vulcan, Hikaru’s life had changed in ways he never would have imagined. He’d helped with the registries, stylus shaking as he strikes through another name with the knowledge that he’ll never see that person again. So many of his friends died or had been registered as missing. Suddenly, every memory of friendship and happiness from the Academy is paired with the strain of grief and duty, guilt wedged in his throat.

When Gaila’s name is called with so many others at the Vulcan Remembrance ceremony, the silence that follows afterward is absolutely painful and cuts to his core.

He finds Uhura in the quad afterward. Her arms are curled around her torso, and he can see the shivers on the verge of turning into sobs.

Hikaru's not sure if she wants company, but he owes it to her.

He steps forward, stands next to her and follows her eyes to the red pillars of the Golden Gate Bridge standing in the distance. She stays silent but relaxes a little, inviting him closer. She strains to smile at him like she’s asking for his companionship, and he finds it painful to smile back.

"I didn't know I was going to miss this place the way I did when we weren't here," she says, eventually. "How about you?"

He purses his lips together, shrugging. "Those 'hurry up and wait' times, you know, I always think about things then. About the things you'll never get to see again if anything goes wrong. Family, friends, that little cafe down on Columbus."

She looks at him fleetingly, and he can hear the rumble of a laugh in remembrance. The air's calm but whips up every now and then, combing through his hair and sweeping across her skirt, a soft breeze in heat. She looks over at him. "What are you doing with your shore leave? Are you staying here?"

"For a while," he says. "A couple of days, I guess. See my family and the few friends I have that didn’t decide to go to Starfleet. A friend conned me into house-sitting up in Portland next week."

"You had that planned before Vulcan, right?"

"Not at all," he groans. "He did it right after he found out I was still alive. I think he's bringing his daughter down here to see if she wants to join up with Starfleet."

"You always have the most interesting friends," she says, sarcastically. “They’re such a charming and opportunistic bunch.”

Hikaru looks at her. "Present company excluded, I presume? Unless little miss perfect is willing to admit her opportunism.”

She shoves him playfully.

He continues. “This guy never did have a particularly good sense of timing. I guess I could consider it part of his charm. And what are you doing with your leave?"

"Tying up loose ends will take me a few days. I haven't decided about what I'm doing with the rest of my free time. It's not nearly long enough for a real trip home, although I wish it could," she says as the breeze passes by the two of them. She lifts her face up curiously like the wind's caressing her cheek. Hikaru's fingers itch with the wish to trace the curve of her jaw. It's obvious, how much that touch could change them, how much the space between them means to her and their friendship. He looks over to the bridge instead, the stretch of sea and the hill on the other side.

His fingers curl into fists at his side, and he tries not to look too shaken. "Nothing with Spock?"

Her nose crinkles in what has to be either disgust or disappointment. "Does everyone know about that?"

He raises an eyebrow and tries not to look too surprised. "Were you expecting people not to know about that? With close quarters like the Enterprise, gossip'll travel fast. Especially when a Vulcan is involved. The minute we got off the ship, half the Academy knew."

"Oh, come on. It was maybe two kisses and everyone's freaking out like I've had his child," she says.

"Uhura, the girl who’s got a picture of her face right next to the Federation Standard definition of ‘independence,' just so happened to fall in love? Sure, like you’d ever let that happen without history there," he says, sarcastically. "All of that just happened completely out of the blue, hmm?"

She sighs, exasperated. "And why aren't you inviting Chekov?"

"Pavel's spending time with his girlfriend," he says, shrugging. "Answer my question. I asked first."

She's stoic. "Commander Spock and I have built a companionship that relies on amicable fulfillment, not physical relations. When I see something he needs that I have, I'll offer to provide it, and suggest a course of action if that is not the case. It's logical and mutually beneficial."

"Mighty canned response to say you're each other's 'wingman'?" He tisks, acting concerned. "He's been rubbing off on you, Uhura, hasn't he?"

"Wingmen, to my knowledge, don't rub off on each other on a somewhat-regular basis in semi-public places," she teases.

"You know they totally can. And you know you totally love it," he says.

She makes a frustrated noise like she’s bitter. "I don't even know if he's staying with Starfleet at this point. He could be going to New Vulcan, wherever they're deciding that is."

He has an idea. "You should come to Portland with me.”

"Because I really want to spend several consecutive days in Portland with this delightful banter, Sulu," she replies flatly.

"Ouch. You don't have to act like you hate it that much. Wouldn’t it be good to get away?"

"Come with me to get lunch and I'll think about it, asshole," she says, punching his arm. He tries to act hurt, but she's already walking away.

She tells him she'll come along a half-hour later, her voice soft but not defeated. He tries not to look too relieved.

 

 

 

The beach is different, when he visits. There's no change in the breeze, and the sand between his toes feels like he always remembered. It's easy to think about how close this came to not existing, and he wonders how many times he's taken it for granted. He walks to the water's edge and lets the sea lap at his ankles. He raises his head, staring up at the sky, eyes daring to strafe near the beautiful brilliant light of the sun and move away.

He closes his eyes, lets it shine through his eyelids.

The air is too fresh; the gravity too real. He realizes he wants to be there, again. He wants to explore that sky, taking in all of its alarm, fear and glory, testing himself time after time. It's what he needs: San Francisco is not the place for him anymore. There’s a good chance it’ll never be the place for him ever again. He’s bled this place dry, and even though the city is as familiar as anything in his life could ever be, he needs more.

The discovery horrifies him almost as much as everything else does right now.

 

 

 

She looks different the next time he sees her. She's wearing civilian clothes: a threadbare t-shirt and jeans. She smiles at him from across the platform, looking more relaxed than the last time he'd seen her. Her hair is down, arranged in waves and layers hugging at her face and moving with the breeze. Even though he's seen her like this before, he never knows how to tell her she looks beautiful this way. He bites his tongue and decides that it’s best to leave well enough alone.

He notices that Uhura's bag is tiny. It can't possibly allow for anything bigger than a PADD, a few changes of clothes and her travel kit. Hikaru wonders if she's traveling light on purpose. She tells him hello as he points at her bag.

"What'd you bring?" he asks.

"A couple of Klingon texts I never had the time or patience to translate," she says, shrugging as she picks a piece of lint from her pants. "It's light reading."

He turns and stares at her. "Light reading. Of course."

She grins at him. "Of course. What did you bring? That ridiculous sword of yours?"

"Everyone talks about the sword," he sighs. "Yeah, I brought the sword. Can we talk about something else I brought with me?"

Her smile widens, the sarcasm a welcome lilt in her voice. "Hikaru, it's not like anything else matters as much as that sword."

"Not even the extra pair of shoes or the collection of 20th century spy movies I brought?"

"Well, no," she says firmly. "Nobody will remember you for the movies, Sulu. And ships can pilot themselves nowadays, but that sword isn't going to kill just because you say that it should. You and that sword are meant to be."

"I have more than two speeds, you know. It's not all just 'walk' and 'kill,'" he says, sitting down on a nearby bench.

"You should be so lucky," she says, joining him. "Besides, you did make Kirk realize there are other awesome phallic things in the world beyond whatever he's got attached to his body."

"Ugh," Hikaru sighs. "He makes me sound like I was swashbuckling.”

"I can assure you I'd pay a decent amount of my salary to see that, you know."

He makes a face and tries not to focus on the way she shakes when she genuinely laughs. He looks away with a dramatic sigh, trying hardest not to laugh with her. "You and half the freaking crew. Can you imagine how many jokes about pillaging for booty I’ve garnered in the last few days?"

"Can you promise me something?"

“As long as it has nothing to do with booty,” he blurts out, then shakes his head at the sudden turn in the conversation. She’s staring off into the distance, and he frowns at her question, thinking it over. "I hope you’re aware that's a terrible way to start a conversation."

"Shut up," she says, half-serious. "It's just... Can we not talk about it for a few days? Any of it? No Vulcan or the ship or anything like that?"

"I don't see why not," he says.

"I just... I'd like to be unaware of things for a while. I want to be one of those people who doesn't realize how close they came to..."

He's not sure if she's bottling her emotions up, or if she's simply run out of use for words. She smiles, but it doesn't reach her eyes.

She doesn't even have to say anything, he knows what's tearing her apart.

Gaila's dead. So many of their friends are dead. As far as he's concerned, the two of them really shouldn't be alive either. The awareness attacks him in waves, keeping him up at night, and sending chills down his back since Vulcan. He sees broken ships behind his eyes, sometimes, and the spiral of red turning into black at others.

Hikaru didn't see the planet implode. Still, the word 'genocide' makes his breath catch and burn in his throat. He stood by helplessly as one happened.

None of them could stop it. None of them could stop anything.

Against his better judgment, he places a hand on her shoulder silently. She looks down the bag in her lap. The two of them sit there, the only sound between them breath after shaky breath. Uhura sighs, fragile like she's been crying a lot in the time he hasn't seen her, like she's trying not to do it in front of him.

"It's okay that you don't want to talk, but if you do..." he starts.

"Maybe on the way back." She shrugs his hand from her shoulder, catches and holds it instead of letting it slip away. He tenses, ready for a stern look and a prim grasp of her hand at his wrist, suggesting he keep to himself. Instead, she plays with his fingers idly, then weaves them in with hers. He looks at the curve of her wrist when she links their fingers together. Another shiver slides down his spine, and he's not sure that it has anything to do with Vulcan.

When the shuttle comes, she says, "So, tell me about this movie collection you brought."

 

 

 

It's raining when they get to Portland, hazy gray sky and infuriating drizzle. The taxi driver keeps talking when all Hikaru wants is quiet and a week's slumber and freedom from the worries that have kept him up. He's almost longing for it.

The house isn't huge, but there are pets to feed and numerous plants to water. It's a good thing he's not alone with three Terriers and a whole room of ferns and palms and blossoms: he'd dote on the flowers endlessly and not know where to even begin paying attention to the dogs or himself. He'd lose himself in the feel of soil alone and never think to eat.

Even though he should collapse onto the nearest cushioned surface, he spends an unholy amount of time adjusting the lamps in the greenhouse, pruning the leaves, making sure the soil is moist enough and that nothing in the place will spontaneously die on his watch. Uhura leaves him to the greenhouse so she can care for the dogs. He doesn't realize she's gone until the door softly clicks shut behind her. He sighs, aware that she probably left because he's holding a pair of pruning sheers in his teeth and has been encouraging a group of lilacs for the last half an hour.

It's a good trade-off: the dogs seem to love Uhura. Hikaru notes with a tinge of jealousy that the smallest one is the most smitten. As he steps back into the house, it toddles past him enthusiastically, hungry for her attention. He follows it to the living room, curious to see if it will pay him any mind, but it's like he's invisible. It jumps up onto the couch, curling up in Uhura's lap. It's clear she's been thinking hard about something, but the dog shakes her from her thoughts. She takes its face in her hands. He watches her coddle it in a dozen languages he can't hope to identify. The dog yaps happily, and for a few seconds Hikaru's almost sure it understands. It curls into an even tighter ball, and Uhura looks like she wishes she could do the same.

He throws himself on the couch and lets his body sag, head easing backward. "How's your day been, Uhura? Half as tiring as mine?"

She shrugs half-heartedly. "Slow, I guess. Why don't you ever call me Nyota?"

He pauses at that and frowns, "What’ve I done to finally deserve your name, huh?"

She purses her lips. "I just thought you didn't know it."

"I knew it. I've known it for a long time. I just don't use it."

"Well, I think you should start using it." she says, primly.

“Nyota? It’s going to take some getting used to. Nyota. Nyota,” he grins, letting the sound of her name pull at his throat.

She rolls her eyes. "Why do you have to be so difficult? I'm trying to be a nice, thoughtful, responsible friend."

He gives her a sideways glance, wrestling the dog off her lap. "Are you sure I can't give you a nickname, being the difficult person that I am, Nyota?"

She's quiet. "No."

The dog yaps at him, squirming in his hold.

"I'm... I'm sorry."

"Are you apologizing to the dog, or to me?" she asks him.

"I dunno," he says, without thinking. "I might be apologizing to myself, at this point. I'm not sure."

The dog yaps again, little legs kicking out like it's begging for something other than this, and he sits it in his lap, lets it lick at his fingers. She says something in Vulcan, and places a hand on his knee.

He bites his lip, putting his thoughts aside. "So what do you want to eat tonight, Nyota?"

 

 

 

That night, between visions of dead ships and bodies given over to the vastness of space, he dreams of the first time they met. He dreams of the awkward blind date, the conversation about relativism and Starfleet protocol that had gotten far too heated and almost emotional in the cafe on Columbus, the cup of coffee that was so hot it burnt his tongue. She’d given him these looks, however, and her smile had made all of his slip-ups with her irrelevant.

He remembers the first time he let himself touch her, arms around her waist during a dance at the officer's club down the street from his apartment, the skin bared by the back of her dress warm to his fingertips. He remembers how they had been jostled together by the anonymous mass of dancing bodies out on the crowded floor. He had rested his head against hers, eventually sliding their lips together. Hikaru’s pretty sure that it counts as their first kiss. It was nerve-wracking and felt like the most poorly coordinated thing he’d done in his life.

Even with the foibles, he remembers the distinct feeling of having met someone he would always admire and want in his life, no matter how far apart they were.

It was the little things that changed between them as they shoved against each other in her room. Once they were behind closed doors the endless heat of her mouth on his, and the frustrating way they had kept their clothes on revealed a barely restrained lust that he didn’t even know he held for her. The way she moved had been mesmerizing, and he’d seen the want in her stare, could feel it in her skin whenever she arched into him.

Her hand crept under his shirt and made him shake like he was already addicted to her. In that moment, her touch had been perfect; he’d wanted to follow those fingers anywhere they'd take him.

The next few hours had served as a challenge, a competition with no clear victor. There had been endless trash talk and whispers of what would come after one of them would yield. It was the talk of submission, of conquered bodies ornate with rope and dancing with vibration that forced their stalemate. The tension drew taut as they rolled around, control twisting between them.

They never found the resolution they both had been chasing after.

Instead, the tryst had been as self-absorbed as any one night stand, punctuated with the scratch of institutional carpeting and dirty words in every language they could muster, body heat sprawling everywhere.

She left him breathless with her fingers and tongue, trying to tire him out before she got her own. When he wrestled himself on top, she’d granted him temporary reprieve, and he’d known exactly what to do with it.

She'd looked beautiful when she came, completely focused on her own pleasure.

"I think we should stop before we rip each other to shreds," she'd whispered, later.

"We also probably shouldn't do that again anytime soon. Unless, you know, we get someone to referee next time."

She had laughed, a thick and worn sound that was absolutely captivating. He wanted that sound, and desired to hear it even if he'd never get this again.

"Stay?" she'd asked.

He had. It was already enough of an unexpected night, he'd figured he might as well go for broke and make sure this wasn't going to be a one-night hookup after all.

 

 

 

It's Sunday so the club they're in is pretty dead. It's just private enough to be perfect.

The room is dark save for the cones of light drawn around the tables, like it’s trying to be moody on purpose. The scene reminds him of those organized crime movies Gaila once loved so dearly and spent so much time on his couch watching.

They’d set out to find a place like this for two reasons: booze and people-watching. Were it not for the promise of liquor, he’s pretty sure they wouldn’t be here. Music that would normally be booming is a rather pleasant undercurrent, muted into melodies and sporadic beeps and blips in this tucked away corner they've claimed.

Two drinks in, Nyota points out the fashion-challenged bachelorette party two tables over, gleefully pile-driving through Cardassian Sunrises. They never stare, but it’s easy to look fleetingly to the group huddled around their table, adorned with silly pink hats and feather boas, forcing novelty presents of fuzzy handcuffs and robotic tongues at the bride to be. The spectacle is almost too brutal to watch, and yet too fascinating to turn away from.

Hikaru smiles to himself greedily over the rim of his shot glass: mission accomplished.

If this were San Francisco, he might be a little braver, and go over there in hopes of titillating the poor lady into some helpful amnesty from her drunken friends, give an open invitation to sit with Nyota and him, strike up a useful conversation. They’ve done it before, used a little swagger to tease the bachelorette’s blitzed friends into thinking the invitation was really for more.

It doesn’t take much to remind him that this isn’t San Francisco.

It takes some work to rip his eyes away from the party, but he turns and tells Nyota of home. He listens as she tells him of the new room she's been given until the Enterprise is ready to fly again. He sees the way her face contorts in grief as she talks about packing, but says nothing. He stares at the two glasses on the table while wondering why the hell the alcohol hasn't made this conversation awkward and listless.

Nyota jabs him gently in the ribs. It's jarring and intimate, tickling in a place she never touches him. She's directing him to the bride-to-be getting a ball and chain wrapped around her ankle and proceeding to begrudgingly show it off, posing for picture after picture. The juxtaposition of intimacy against the humiliation unfolding in front of them makes him ache for more, even though he’s not sure what more he wants.

Nyota huddles in even closer and he can't dismiss the heat radiating off her body. His eyes fixate on the curve of her lips while she smirks. He can feel himself relax in the way he does when liquor thinks for him.

When the waitress comes around, Nyota leans forward to whisper into the waitress' ear that she wants the bottle. The woman looks at the two of them, throwing a token smile in his direction as she walks off.

"To the rest of the night," Nyota says, pouring a toast.

He lifts his glass. "To the rest of the night."

The liquor burns sweet as it slides down his throat; his patience is growing thin and his stomach is a ball of tension. His awareness screams at him about how close she is, how she's leaning into him in a way she never has before. He slides his arm around her, trying to decode the mixed signals she’s sending.

"You're thinking pretty hard about something, Hikaru. What's on your mind?" she asks.

He drags the hair away from her ear and whispers. "I'm thinking about us."

She looks at him carefully. "What do you mean?"

"I... dunno. I just miss you," he says, the ring of finality almost too melodramatic. " I feel like I’m failing at everything, right now. I can’t help you and I can’t help me and it hurts. It sucks. Not good helpless.”

Fuck, he’s drunker than he thought.

“Sweetheart, that wasn’t a sentence.”

He snorts; so much for that consolation he told himself he wasn’t looking for.

She shrugs. "Besides, it's not like I've been the world's greatest friend, either. I want things I shouldn't be expecting you to give. I've got a lot on my mind, and I hoped that I wasn't going to ruin our trip -- it's one of the reasons why I've been so quiet."

Her last comment shocks him. He pours another shot, cursing himself for ruining a good night, a good vacation, a good friendship. He’s already in a bit of a stupor, so what’s another few rounds in hopes of a full blown hangover in the morning instead of something he could probably walk off?

"Name one thing you're asking for, and I won’t say no to it," he says, tilting his head back to take the shot. Before he's done drinking, she's grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him even closer, the two of them splitting the liquor in his mouth before he can even get half a mind to swallow.

He relaxes, fingers tracing her jaw. He's thought about this a thousand times, bottled it up and tried to suppress it, aware of all the ways this couldn't work, all the boundaries between them.

She's contemplative when they separate, watching him. Heat wells in the pit of his stomach, blood flushing his skin and he watches as she traces the outline of her lips with her thumb.

"You could not have possibly known how much I've wanted that since we got here, Sulu," she says, biting her lip.

"You thought I wouldn't have wanted..."

"I don’t want to expect anything when I'm around you," she says. The words hang between them. "I shouldn't do things just because I’m scared.”

"You shouldn't avoid doing things because they make you look vulnerable, though," he says quietly.

Her eyes fall closed, and he swears can see what she's telling him in the inward smile on her face. She's wearing (black, sparkling, painted-on) pants, and he wishes he could reach down and touch her right now. Being so close to her is familiar, and his body responds.

Maybe this is what he can do right now, selfish as it sounds, in hopes that she'll really let him in.

He summons up the courage and kisses her properly. He strokes the spot behind her ear, knowing it drives her crazy. He listens to the sound she makes, trying to memorize it. She kisses back like she's trying not to scream, sobs of breath and endless emotion on his lips.

When they break apart, he looks over at the bachelorette party again, and sees two women looking at them with wistful smiles on their faces. He wonders what the hell he and Nyota look like to them. He wonders if he and Nyota will ever look like that: old friends that take a voyeuristic pleasure in lovers passing them by in dark bars like this one.

With the awareness that they’re after-dinner entertainment, he slips his mouth near her ear as she takes another shot. His fingers drag against newly revealed skin as her head tips back and reveals her neck, working to swallow as he positions his mouth against the curve of her jaw.

"Do you trust me?"

Her smile stings, bittersweet and predatory and wholly directed at him. "More than anyone in the universe right now."

 

 

 

The walk home is quiet. He's led by the steady, urgent clopping of Nyota's heels on wet pavement. Their hands are huddled into coat pockets and it’s like they’re barely even aware of each other. Hikaru wonders if an outsider would think they were angry with each other or almost robotic with sterile determination. The buzz of liquor slowly disappears under the cool air, leaving only silly musings and a desire for warmth any way he can find it.

Somehow, everything's changed; his heart's pounding in his chest, his cock is hard in his jeans as he finds himself thinking of how good she'll taste, how beautiful she'll look spread out for him.

His blood turns hot and adrenaline fills his veins. The chance of feeling instead of thinking or remembering when it comes to her is almost too much.

He watches as her movements become slower, more seductive, almost enrapturing. She doesn't reach out to cement whatever she's thinking by touching him, but he can see the way her want affects her, and doesn't even realize he's slowed down to match her stride. She acts as if she's absolutely unaware of her effect on him.

She whispers, "how long should I be expecting to wait for this, Hikaru?"

His brows furrow. “What do you mean? I didn’t think you were the kind of girl who needed an estimated timetable for sex.”

She turns around so she's walking backwards. Huddled in her jacket, she stares like her eyes are ripping him apart. "Do you think we’ll actually go all the way this time?”

"Cute. Could we at least get into the house, first?”

"You’re wondering about it, too. Do us both a favor and admit it," she says, stumbling a little. "A woman’s gotta be realistic in this day and age..."

He takes her by the waist and walks up the stairs to the house. She feels warm, points of contact burning between them.

"You? Patient?" he mutters hotly into her neck after he gets her through the door. Everything’s so gloriously warm in here, a stark contrast to the cold and efficient walk home.

He leans against her in the dim light of the entryway and she smiles, draping arms over his shoulders, trailing her fingers down the back of his shirt. There's an undeniable feeling of suspense, but he casts it aside and pulls his body to hers, their lips meeting again. He wants to stretch this out until he can see the tension between them, all uncontrollable desperation and the insanity of need. Her hand slides into his hair, tugging at it like she needs something of his to hang onto, something to stabilize her. She positions a thigh between his legs, shoving him against the wall while she tugs at his fly.

"You’re hard,” she says, like she was expecting more work. “How long have you been hard?”

"Since we walked into that club," he says.

"Could have said something, Hikaru," she says, her voice dropping low. "Or did you not want me to blow you while all those women watched? They were all looking at you, wishing you were there with them instead of me. Telling each other about what they’d do if they got their hands on someone like you."

The thought of Uhura on her knees with her mouth on his cock in a public place is absolutely ridiculous; she'd never attempt something so crass. Even if she tried, Hikaru’s pretty sure he’d never let her go through with it.

"I’m flattered, but at least two or three of them wanted to be there with you.” He says. “You never did strike me as the exhibitionist type."

It’s easy to fantasize about it, though. Hikaru imagines the waitress' scowl as Nyota declares her ownership in a bar full of women, his fingers slipping through Nyota’s hair as he resolves to keep his hips pinned into the sofa, let her do anything she wants to him.

"You never told me you got off on making people jealous.”

“You never asked,” he grins, stealing a kiss as opens her mouth to reply. She melts into him, making the kind of noise that gets him shivering under her hands.

“Are you thinking about my mouth, Sulu?” she asks, hangs his name on a whimper. He captures her lips again, kisses the breath right out of her, hips dragging lazily against her thigh.

“I’m thinking about a lot of things, right now,” he says.

“Like what?”

“Like where I want that mouth to go.”

She laughs, shoving two fingers into their kiss just to get them wet, reaching down to tease at the head of his cock. He hisses, drawing his lips down the long column of her neck, biting at the skin under her chin. "You want me to suck you off?”

“God, yes.”

“How many times have you thought about coming on my face since the last time?"

He laughs at that, his voice husky enough he can't even recognize it. "About as many times as you've thought about coming on mine."

Her fingers curl around him, just a little bit of pressure from her nails, as she bites at his lip. "That’s a… big number. Thought about you on your knees, dragging you backward by your hair. You always love it, whenever I imagine it, like you can’t get enough of me.”

"Fuck," he says gasping as her fingers close around him tight.

"Learn some manners and ask me nicely," she snaps back, dropping to her knees and arranging his pants down around his thighs, fingers slipping at his underwear. She throws her hair over one shoulder as she curls her tongue along the vein and engulfs the head of his cock. He groans as she takes more, not stopping until she's ready to gag.

For a few minutes, the whole house is silent, with the dogs content and quiet. His mouth hangs open and slack as she gives him perfection with short bobs and long drags. He's not going to fight this off, not the way she's getting to him right where it counts. He knows she wants him to return the favor.

But first things first, he slumps over, combs his fingers through her hair, and smiles as he whispers, "Let me…"

"What," her voice is hazy thick as she pulls away, interrupting. "Not going slow enough for you?"

He laughs at that, a good, deep laugh, and when she opens her mouth and sits there, he doesn't do anything. He just lets her wait, slicking his thumbs over her wet lips.

"You just look so fucking hot like this," he groans, and slips his thumb in next to his cock. She raises an eyebrow and opens her mouth a little wider. He thrusts deeper, leans back against the door panel and angles his hips up just right, keeps thrusting like he's trying to fit all of himself down her throat before he comes. He takes his time and gives her space to breathe, trying to savor her.

She waits until he starts getting desperate, slipping away when she thinks he's going to come. He gasps.

This is exactly what makes them good friends in the first place: they get each other. They are more alike than they are different. He understands that some things apply to everything a person does.

"Cooperation, Sulu. I'm sure you understand the concept," she says sternly.

He helps her off her knees and tries not to rut against her like an animal. He looks down at her lips, just this side of swollen, and he needs it. He needs to capture her again, kiss her this time until she's wanton, her thighs opening in a way that would be tempting to slip between, his hips thrusting against her until he comes all over her pants. She packs him back into his trousers almost daintily, and he hides in her shoulder, moaning.

"Have you thought of any way this ‘cooperation’ could work?" He asks.

"I have a few ideas," she grins.

It's easy to walk her backwards, lifting her shirt over her head as he leads her into the bedroom. She nudges him to the bed. He watches as she reaches behind herself and unclasps her bra, holding his gaze as she lets it drop.

”I want to know how wet you are," he says, tugging her pants down her thighs and right off before he turns them over. "I want to drive you crazy."

"That's not an acceptable definition of cooperation, but I can get with it," she says as he presses her legs up and open, sucking her clit into his mouth. He gets greedy and relishes her moans, her hips thrusting up to his attention.

"Out of curiosity, do you know how to not be bossy?" he asks.

"Wouldn't have to if you fucked me already," she huffs, but melts into the sheets as he opens her right down the middle, licking at her until he can slip two fingers in and angle them just right, getting her on edge as well. She gasps and slips her legs over his shoulders, thighs poised to close around his head if she doesn't get her way.

He smiles, pausing to tease her before kissing her with everything he has.

 

"Didn't we decide we were going to have sex, already?" she groans.

"I didn’t think we had decided anything,” he teases. “Unless I missed all of that imagining circumstances where you’d actually commit acts of exhibitionism with me.”

She leans upward, pushing him onto his back, straddling over his face. He hits the bed with a thud, and she smiles down at him, fiercely.

"Stop joking and make me come."

He knows when to do as he's told.

 

 

 

The contraception question isn't a matter of necessity, but a matter of ritual. For all of the barbs he and Nyota trade, and all the ways they get meaner the more they want each other, he thinks the idea of such simple worship is, well, a compliment. A lot of his friends would say things like searching for condoms are a buzz kill, but he’s sure that Nyota could use the break, given the way she just came; back arching, thighs shaking, fingers linked with his as if she already wasn’t encouraging him to go harder and deeper and turn her into a wreck.

He's calm, even though he’s full of anticipation. Hikaru never does like relying on hyposprays Starfleet's given them to deter pregnancy when he knows there are other forms of contraception somewhere in this house. Call him old fashioned or perhaps more aware, or chalk it up to the partners he’s had that were not given the same medical privileges as Starfleet servicemen and women. Any way you look at it, it’s just polite.

In the Academy, Nyota had been quite happy to be untouchable, quick to dispense biting comebacks and searing insults to all comers. Hikaru hadn't been immune to that himself: the hiss of _"I'd like to see you try to handle me just to watch you fail"_ rings in his ears whenever he thinks of her before Gaila introduced them. It wasn't okay, but what was he expecting? He was focused on his piloting and his research and not much of anything else.

He’d been through a series of absurd relationships with childish dynamics, and she'd been paired with him for her own good or Gaila’s own sanity: their date was a cosmic joke.

Now? Her skin almost shines with the glow of sweat, and she's laid out on the bed like an offering, her hair everywhere and her chest heaving. She sits up on her forearms, still reeling.

"Did you find any?" she asks, hopeful. She fixes her hair to one side, letting it drape over her shoulder. She looks amazing, genuine.

He doesn't speak for a second, looking at her. She seems concerned, but he doesn't think she'll be devastated if he says no. Looking at her he realizes how much she's changed, how all of his initial impressions of her were totally wrong.

He holds one of the packets up, licks his lower lip, and commits to doing this right.

"Yeah. I got them."

 

 

 

He thrusts into her: one long surge that makes her body come alive underneath him. She groans, her back arching, pressing flushed and warm skin up against his stomach.

"Hikaru," she gasps, clenching down on him like she never plans on letting go.

"Giving you what you wanted was a good idea, after all, wasn't it?" he asks.

He can’t tell if she’s groaning or laughing, and her fingers claw into his hair. "Wanted this so badly, Hikaru."

He stills, bottomed out inside her, dragging his mouth in messy patterns across her chest, up her shoulder, up her neck to her ear, his voice a hot whisper, "I know."

It comes out cockier than he wanted it to, but she takes it well, snarling and positioning her hips up to meet him. She tugs him down to surround her.

"Move," she growls.

"Make me," he dares.

It's quiet between them, ever-changing for a few tense minutes. They find themselves in that stalemate again, still defiant with each other. He lets the hold he has on his control slip, his hips falling into a rhythm, her body following along. His fingernails dig into the flesh of her back, dragging a little further down with every thrust, and he moans selfishly at the pressure.

"Wanna mark you everywhere," he says, pressing his mouth to her collarbone, biting down at the skin.

"I'd like to see you try. Stop acting like I’m made out of glass," she scoffs. He gathers her up and changes position. Far from submissive, she moves herself when he's thinking about moving her, gets off on beating him to the punch.

He sits her in his lap, folds her legs around him, fucking up into her and watching as her whole body takes him in.

She groans, "Touch me."

He pushes his hips forward, finding an angle that makes her squeal as he lifts his fingers to her lips. He thrusts his hips in hard, lets his fingers sweep into her mouth to pull them back out wet, pressing them to her clit.

She wraps around him as she fucks herself down. "Shit, right there. Fuck, right fucking there. C'mon, I want it. Fuck, want it so fucking bad. Make me come, Hikaru."

He closes his eyes and rests against the yards of her skin he's got surrounding him, losing himself in the bounce of her breasts against his chest. He slows down, stretching each stroke out until she's angry she hasn't gotten her way, hips bucking and muscles clenching. She makes the sexiest noise he's ever heard, half a question, half an order, and he thrusts in a little quicker. He repositions them on the bed, laying her on her side as he gathers her legs up to her chest. When he sinks into her, she screams at the places he’s brushing against.

"Harder!”

He's defiant, deliberately teasing. "You’re fuckin’ gorgeous when you’re impatient."

She bites at his jaw, whimpering when he gives in and fucks her hard, hips snapping out of control, rough against her legs, yanking her hair back enough to give him room to bow and suck at her nipples. She's holding onto him for dear life, clenching around him. It's good and they work together to drag it out. Whenever she gets too close to coming, he abruptly stops, drags his nails down the expanse of her stomach and gets her hoping he’ll touch her right where she wants it. Whenever he’s ready to come, she clenches and snarls, rolls her hips and makes it hard for him to get enough sensation.

Her hands have grasped into his hair and the sheets, eyes falling shut. She shimmies right up to him, gasping. "Make me come, Hikaru. Just... c'mon."

She’s so close, squirming for that extra bit of stimulation. He smiles cockily, and knows he’ll want the feeling of this as many times as she’s willing to help him get it, if he could ever leverage such a deal.

He slams in one last time, and it sets off a chain reaction: a sharp intake of breath and a broken whimper, the first clench of her climax, his own release, her uncontrollable shuttering and the arch of her back that seemingly leverages him even deeper. He grabs at her in support, listens to her strangled screaming of his name, shifting angle inside her again and triggering off another wave of her orgasm. He stares as her hands clench at the sheets.

He opens eyes he hadn't even realized he'd closed, and decides not to think about how good she looks this way, how it's even better than he'd fantasized. She's trying to catch her breath, and he makes things a little harder for her, kissing her again. He fingers at her clit so he can make her come even as he draws out like he wants her to feel every detail. She groans, hips shifting left and right, body language begging him for rest.

"So, I'm going to want to eat you again, soon," he says, casually.

"Did you invite me out here _just_ to kill me?" she asks.

He laughs at that, getting up to get rid of the condom. "While I'm here I guess it's as good a time as any..."

Her thighs are still shaking as he returns, lying on his stomach as he sweeps his hand against it. She looks like she's about to fold and genuinely beg him for mercy, but curls into his touch instead, hungry for the sensation. He leads her to looking at him by a finger tucked under her chin, and kisses her soft and slow, relishing the intimacy, aware of boneless way she looks and he feels. His smile is searing and real, and he looks at her sinking into the sheets, her chest heaving.

His hand settles over her stomach, but they don't curl into each other when sleep comes. Instead, he hauls the covers over them, looking at her wordlessly and dimming the lights. She smiles: calm and almost too personal, intimate and content. She looks radiant.

He’s not sure about much of anything, right now, but Hikaru knows he’d give a lot to see that smile over and over again.

 

 

 

The morning comes too quickly, light breaking in through half-opened shades. He squints and tries to stretch. When he finds he can't, he takes comfort in the fact that they're all twisted together, his face in the pillow and her face resting in the valley his spine makes down the middle of his back.

 

 

 

He's on his third cup on coffee. He didn't realize the ground was so soggy before they put the blanket down and tried to sit on it in the backyard. It should be depressing, but he finds it comforting, a simple pleasure in a time where he's not sure how many of those he'll be getting after the next few days. She's writing translation in a worn composition notebook, her PADD next to her, her handwriting loopy and messy. He tries not to look and fails, sabotaging his own efforts under the guise of looking back at the house, or looking down at her hand.

One of the dogs comes over and curls up in the rounded negative space of his arm at his side, and he lets it settle, scratching at it gently as it cuddles into him.

"What are you thinking about?" she asks.

"Universes," he says, and he can almost hear her eyes rolling. "How many versions of us do you think are out there?"

"Not my area," she says, and slides the tip of her pen into her mouth in thought.

"I know. It's just..."

"You looking for an answer or are you musing about how many copies of yourself are sitting on a blanket just like this one right now?" she asks. "It could easily be solved with a quick comm to Pavel."

He snorts, and does an impression of Chekov he's been perfecting for just the right moment. "Russians invented this whole 'multiple universes' theory, Hikaru. Ah, yes. Let me just run the obligatory calculations and, yes, forty-eight. There are forty-eight parallel universes, and of course this means we reside in Universe One. That has a nice ring to it, doesn't it, Hikaru?"

She rolls over, laughing. "You're such an ass, _Walter_."

"I may be an ass or any number of other things, but that doesn't mean you can invoke my middle name," he says as she rests her head on his shoulder and lets him wrap his free arm around her shoulders. He closes his eyes; the frayed damp cotton of her t-shirt soft under his fingertips.

He wonders if there's a universe where this is his house, his girlfriend, his dogs, his plants and his wet, soggy grass. The illusion’s pleasant, even though he dislikes such overt domesticity. He lets it settle in his head and tries to remember everything about it, another pleasure he can hold onto for later. She tucks her head under his chin, skin to skin. He closes his eyes and smiles; she’s warm against him.

"Do you think you’re up for going out again tonight, Sulu?"

He blinks. "You want to get drunk again."

"I was thinking about something more like some dinner, but if you really want..."

"I don't think my liver will be able to take another bottle of Jack with you," he points out.

She snorts, shoving at him playfully. "Fuck that, I'm sure my liver won't be able to take another bottle of Jack with you. I knew you’re much more into beer than hard liquor. I didn’t expect we were gonna be going shot for shot half of the night.”

“You’re telling me that now. I always thought that was some party trick you did to get guys thinking you were more butch than they were," he says.

"You have a weird concept of seduction."

"I never said you were doing it to seduce them."

 

 

 

For dinner, he wrangles her into a hole-in-the-wall storefront that makes Andorian food served on plates that look like Styrofoam cartons. They sit together on one side of the table, hip-to-hip, casually stealing food from each other’s plates.

She tells him about her translation and asks him about the plants. He tells her about his sword and the improvements he made while supervising a new sproutling in the greenhouse, and asks her about the proper pronunciation of the dish he's eating. When she says she isn’t even sure if it’s Andorian, given the ingredients list, they spend the rest of the meal debating the implications of human-appropriated off-world cuisine.

His heart aches; this is one thing he’ll genuinely miss about Earth.

It’s a good dinner, a good start to the night, but it's also Monday. All the nightclubs are either empty or closed. They sit in the restaurant far longer than they should, moving from dinner to coffee.

"Let's go home, Nyota."

"Are you all right?" she asks. "Tired? Did the food make you sick?"

"I'm fine, but I think I have a better idea of how to spend some time."

"Oh?"

He waits a bit, then leans in to press his forehead to the side of her face and whisper in her ear, "I want you inside me."

She pauses, and it's like he can see the wheels turning in her head as she turns to him, trying to see if it’s a joke. He turns away, coyly picking up the cup of coffee on the table, sipping at it casually.

“You're joking with me, right?"

"How much do you want to bet?" he asks. The restaurant is empty save for the customers passing through to get take away. “I want you to take me, do whatever you want and you’re thinking it some kind of joke. You should know by now that I don’t joke about things I want.”

He could dirty talk her all night if she really doesn’t believe him, whispers about all the noises he’ll make for her, and all the ways he wants to put his mouth on her. He wonders what the imagery would do to both of them, the thought of that kind of worship while sitting in a restaurant window watching cars pass by over a second cup of coffee.

She sits there, silent. He turns to look out the window, watching a motorcycle zoom down the street. She anchors her chin on his shoulder, arms wrapping around his shoulders from behind, the two of them looking out at the darkness. Her voice is like velvet, like a femme fatale from a film noir.

"I guess I’ll have to bet the house, then, before I start thinking about all the ways I could regret it.”

“Like I’d ever let you do anything to me that you’d regret,” He says, softly. He turns to her, whispering like he’s inulging her in a secret. “You’re wet with just the thought of it, I know you are. That’s what you’ve really been fantasizing about, isn’t it, having whatever part of me you want?”

“Hikar-“

“Answer me,” he says softly, firmly. Anybody looking in from the outside would think they’re arguing over something, the way Nyota’s nails are tapping against her coffee cup, the cadence of his voice. “You think about it all the time.”

“Yeah, I do,” she smiles. “Finish your coffee so we can go home, Hikaru."

 

 

 

They're much closer this time during the walk home. He's got his arm around her and they're ambling, her heels still clacking along the pavement. The somewhat emboldened dirty talk that happened in the restaurant has cooled down, thankfully, but Hikaru hopes that Nyota doesn’t just think he’s speaking in filthy hypotheticals. He wants this, and he wants to share it with her. That shouldn’t be a big deal, but he can understand why it is.

Her voice interrupts his thoughts."Are you sure?"

"Hmm?" he asks.

"Are you sure you want me to fuck you?"

"You always used to talk about it, I thought I'd see if you were interested," he shrugs.

"You'd said you didn't want to go there," she points out. "You don’t have to do this for me, we're not keeping score and it's not like I'm going to get crabby about you having the anatomical advantage."

"In all fairness, neither of us wanted to go anywhere near there that night," he points out. "Anatomical advantage?"

"Well, when you put it that way," she says, deadpan. "What's wrong with saying you have an anatomical advantage? It's a satisfying advantage from where I'm standing."

"Uh, thanks for the compliment?" He looks at her, standing in the middle of the empty sidewalk. "Is that your way of telling me you don't want to switch roles or that you aren't into that anymore?"

"That'd be an awful way of telling you anything," she mutters. "I'm just surprised. You're lucky I brought my gear."

He follows her as she walks past him, falls into rhythm with her stride. Her hips swing from side to side like she's dancing, hand at the back of her hip while she looks at him over her shoulder, daring him to catch up. He grins back, teasingly.

"Wait, I saw your bag and it was tiny, how the hell did you fit something like your 'gear' in there?" he asks.

"A girl has to know how to pack, Sulu," she says enigmatically. "Maybe I packed my toothbrush, some soap and deodorant and left the rest of my kit in San Francisco. What about that?"

He tries to remember if she's been wearing makeup, unable to divorce it from anything else. "Were you planning to get some action, Nyota?"

"I may have been willing to gamble," she admits. "I want to know what made you change your mind about the whole thing."

"A few hook-ups, here and there," he shrugs. "Nothing big."

"Look, you don't have to tell me about Kirk, but we both know it happened," she points out.

"We do?" he asks.

"Of course we do. It's not like you and Gaila weren't getting off on sharing notes about him, although I never made it a hobby to keep count of how many other partners the two of you could have possibly and constantly shared. I do have eyes, though, and language is kind of what I do."

He laughs, of course she knew. They were calling Jim the Orion equivalent to 'fucktoy' right in front of a freaking xenolinguist, it's not like she wouldn't have put two and two together.

"And we know all of your inklings about the relationship I have with my Captain take the nuances of our individual personalities into account."

"We do?"

"We do now."

She makes an ecstatic noise at that, eyebrows shooting up in surprise like she's debating what that means in her head. For a second, he thinks she's going to scoff and call him a slut or any other number of things in a number of different languages. For an even weirder moment, he wants to tell her more, to see if her eyes glaze over from the explicit details of how many moves it takes for Jim to get needy, all the ways he can knock Kirk off guard.

He debates even telling her exactly how he got comfortable with bottoming, the act he puts on whenever Jim gets a little too punchy, controlled yet breathless like a 20th century starlet, panting and pleading for Jim not to come, not yet, the both of them pretending it's not an order.

He doesn't tell this to Nyota on the walk home, though, as he watches her long gait. Instead, he files it away as something to get her riled up over another time.

"I should know by now you never back down from a challenge," she smirks.

They stay quiet the rest of the walk.

 

 

 

When they get home, they separate and tend to the house. She sets out water and food for the dogs before she takes them on a walk; he goes to the greenhouse and makes sure that the plants are holding up, watering a few of them and sprinkling out some plant food for the more needy ones.

He sets a clean pitcher for water in the bathroom with two glasses, and watches as she walks in and rummages in her bag as it sits on the counter top, pulling out the lube and the dildo, the worn leather harness. He places a few condoms from his pocket next to the harness, as they both stare.

"I'm not going to bother asking you again," she says, determined but deep in thought, like she's trying to figure where to start with him. He turns to her, punching a button that keeps the door to the bedroom open, hovering in close like he knows what he wants.

He doesn't push her against the bed, or hustle her against the wall. He simply lets her grab onto the ornate door frame as he wedges himself underneath her, lifts her skirt and slips her panties off, letting her step out of them and throwing them aside.

"Sulu, what the hell are you..." Her question falls into an endless moan as he uses just a little pressure against her clit and licks his way down. He doesn't waste time with clever banter or teasing, doesn't draw things out even though he could. He doesn't even stop for breath, her body drawing up like she's trying to half-heartedly tear him away. She's grown restless, trying to hold still like she wants to be polite.

When that fails, she whimpers and curls one of her legs around his back. She clenches into his mouth, screaming something in a language that he can’t focus on enough to recognize.

She's careful to remain balanced as she plays with his hair, wrapping it around her fingers and breaking her litany of noise to announce, in plain and careful English, that he's about to make her come.

He smiles at that, and buries his face in the skin of her thigh, biting as he lets his fingers slip in and curl to finish the job. She twists and turns, and he slips his other hand under her dress to hold her at the crease of her hip. She leans in, covering his hand with hers, nails digging into the skin of his knuckles.

Her mouth hangs open, but the room falls quiet like she's not even breathing anymore, and the foot slung over his shoulder has burrowed under the collar of his shirt, a toe drawing idle swirls on the back of his shoulder until it curls in, taking his skin with it. He indulges himself, moaning as she comes with an overwhelming sense of finality.

She drives him away afterward, whimpering. He knows his lips are filthy wet with her in the way she stares at him, clawing possessively against his neck, her weight dependent on his shoulders and the hand clinging to the doorsil.

He closes his eyes, sucking at his bottom lip like he's trying to chase every last taste of her, like he wants every little drop he can get. He arches up a little more, putting on a show with tousled hair and overused lips. She smiles like a predator as she bends to kiss him, making him aware of just how much she's in control as she uses her teeth. Eventually, she pushes him down into the floor, and it feels foreign to yield this way but the anticipation is enough to soothe whatever part of his ego that may feel bruised.

He gropes for anything that will settle him but it's not going to take much to reveal how much he wants everything she's willing to give.

"We do this my way," she says it like she means every word, like she's going to kill him before she gives him the opportunity to come, "and I want you right here."

"At least I had the decency to fuck you in a bed," he teases weakly as her fingers undo the buttons of his shirt and ripping the black fabric to splay open and rest around him.

She pauses, tracing the smirk of his lips. His eyes float shut, his heart beating thick in his chest. She undoes the fly of his jeans.

"You always were the more _decent_ one," she teases back, winding fingers in his undershirt with a ruthless force. "Take this off."

"It’s not like I’d know," he says.

She lets his words hang in the air, staying silent for a few seconds. Perhaps to show how much he really does want this, he presses his fingers to the foot now sitting on his abdomen, apologetically caressing her ankle. Reluctantly, he does what she asks, heaving his shirt over his head. He looks up at her, catching fingers that are dangling above him into his mouth, tries to use all the performance tricks he'd once only created for Kirk. She pulls her fingers away, watches as his expression doesn’t change, lips parted like he's waiting for anything she'll give him.

"You’ll like it this way."

"How about I give you feedback when we're done."

"Are you this catty every time you bottom?" she grumbles.

He shrugs, “I’d like to think it’s part of the package, but if we’re being honest, it’s fair to say it’s really just for you.”

She stands up tall, looking down her nose at him. Shrugging out of her dress, she lets it pool on his chest, her body naked underneath. When she sits, he lifts his hips in offering, watching as she strips him of his pants easily. He licks his lower lip as she leans over him, slipping her hands around his wrists, taking all of his leverage away. He tries to squirm and reach up for her, but she pulls away. He deflates and she follows, melting over him. Her grip softens. His hands sneak away to grab her and hug her to his chest, groaning as they rub together. She’s doing something that feels like she’s stroking his cock, the sensation overwhelming. He gasps and she smiles into his neck.

She ducks down, licking an aimless pattern over the head of his cock, pressing her tongue all over, dragging her lips down the shaft. He elbows himself up to watch.

"Not tonight, Lothario," she sing-songs. "We're keeping this on task."

"Sir, yes sir," he says curtly.

She raises an eyebrow at his sarcasm, touching his stomach, nails digging into skin until he writhes. "Careful, or I'll be making you call me that all the time."

 

 

 

Hikaru isn’t particularly fond of giving up control. Not because of some kind of previous trauma, or because someone's done him wrong. It's just... He's not that guy. The piloting, the physics, the botany, most of his life has some root in how he feels at home when he's calling the shots.

Maybe it's an urge, a bad habit. He's never been quite sure.

"You sure you can be seen with me?" he'd asked in the morning, watching her dress. "Wouldn't want to wreck that wall of primness, I suppose."

She looked up at him while buckling the top of one boot, smiling. He knows he'd been incredibly lucky to have seen her up close, to have witnessed her shaky breath and seen her hair spread out on institutionalized carpet, heard the soft request for him to stay the night. He tried not to admit to himself that he'd been a touch smitten.

"Stop thinking so hard. Come eat breakfast with me," she'd said. There hadn't been venom in her voice or pity in her eyes, and she seemed unashamed about the events of the night before.

The memory never faded, and he was sure it never would. However, after breakfast all that was left had been camaraderie, and a sense of want that never aged well.

It's through this camaraderie that he's made aware of how fond of control Nyota is, too. At times, she's even more capable of self-discipline than he is, demanding what she wants in a way he never could. He's always admired that about her and secretly wanted to know how she does it, how she manages to find the strength to be so bold all the time. He's envious of her nerve.

He thinks she knows him, too, knows that it doesn't take much to reveal the real dominance he can show, the somewhat sadistic longing to experiment, the need to gauge the reaction to the action and file it away for later use.

Perhaps, though, it's through each other that they've discovered the need to constantly maintain control is a conversation and a compromise, not a mandate.

Hikaru thinks it's possible that now is the time to see where that conversation could lead.

 

 

 

He crashes back down into his body as the fingers inside him brush against his prostate.

"Well, if I would have known you were so responsive, I would have demanded this instead of being polite," she grins wolfishly.

She flicks her wrist and, God, he's sure she's about to fit four fingers in him, maybe even work him over until he's begging for everything she'll give. He makes a wholly unbecoming noise while trying to scratch his nails into the stone floor underneath him. There’s nothing to hold onto within his grasp, and the only other thing he can do is plead for more sensation, fucking himself down on her fingers.

"Just making sure you're still awake," she comments, scratching a trail down his thigh, just enough pain to really get him burning up, breathing irregular.

"I'm ready. Fuck me," he orders sternly, licking his lips and spreading his legs even more, hoping he can beckon her closer. "C'mon, I want you to fuck me."

"You sound good asking for that. You should ask for it more often."

He sits up a bit, his eyes glazing over as he licks his lips, squirming against her. He bites his lip and glances at her from under his eyelashes. He's sure he looks as slutty as he feels, pushing back on her fingers again anyway. "C'mon, want that cock."

"What if I make you suck it first?" she asks.

He doesn't answer verbally, sitting up and opening his mouth playfully as a challenge. Her brow knits softly and her free hand prods at him like she's testing the waters, her fingers stretching his mouth. It’s like she wants to see what's inside him, plotting her next move. He doesn't lick until she slides her fingers across his tongue. The intimacy would shock Hikaru if he weren’t going crazy with need.

When she's satisfied, she straddles his chest, tightening the harness onto her hips, the straps taut. He looks at her, the leather and the dildo she's attached to it, the long curve and burnished head, the carved vein down the underside. She holds the brown material like it’s a part of her body, bringing the head down to push at his lips. It’s different than skin, just a little cooler to the touch. He rolls his tongue around the crown and it tastes foreign. He gazes up and takes pause.

 

“Tell me,” he says, pausing to suck the head into his mouth, let it flirt behind his teeth. It’s heavy in his mouth.

“What?”

“What’re you thinking about?” he asks, pulling away again to speak.

"About how much this must infuriate you, Mister I-don’t-bottom," she grins. He looks up at her, his tongue curling around the head before sucking down the shaft. He opens a little wider and she falls quiet as he sets a pace, sucking like he wants to get her off. Her fingers comb through his hair, the touch familiar at a time when everything about this is new.

He pulls away, lying back on the stone. He watches her shiver as his palms skim over her thighs, letting his fingers curl around the silicone into a fist. "Trust me, ‘infuriate’ isn’t the first word that comes to mind.”

He waits a beat then gets back on it, hands wrapped around her thighs, taking care not to strain the angle he's been holding his head in. She tips his head backward, dragging the wet silicone down his neck as she looks at him. He looks at her for a second before arching his back, lips parted as his eyes slide closed. They both know how eager he is for this, he knows that in the way she looks at him, fingers fluttering against his jugular vein and feeling his pulse.

She’s wet against his chest, and he wonders if this show actually has that effect on her. He ponders slipping his fingers underneath the leather to touch her, stroke her off again.

"Fuck," she says.

"Get some manners and ask me nicely," he parrots, knowing it will set her off. She manhandles him into position, his hips on her thighs, one of his legs lying to the side as she lifts the other one over her shoulder. The head of the toy rubs at his entrance until he's arching up because he wants it, all the pressure welling.

"Like I'd give you the pleasure," she grins, and thrusts in slow enough it could be torture, stretching him wide. He closes his eyes, relishing how she holds him steady like she knows he wants to get it all, make her slide right in and worry afterward.

"Fuck, should have known you'd be huge," he groans, grabbing at her skin, hungry for whatever he can find. She stops, giving him time to adjust, but the burn of entrance fades as quickly as it came. There's only adrenaline skittering all over him now and he pushes back onto her, twisting on her hips. He doesn't need the reprieve, wishing she wouldn’t be so polite. He claws at her as she pulls out halfway and slams back into him, pushing him backward on the stone, his shirt pinned under him. Jagged edges jab into him, pain rasping down his back.

"Desperation suits you," she comments impassively. He stares up at the ceiling before grasping at her, reaching to kiss her. “You look stunning.”

She rearranges him onto his knees, and he surprises himself by following her command, arching his back. He shivers as she traces the crease of his spine, the stone hard on his knees. She teases him, lining up, the head still a steady pressure at his entrance. The seconds drag on with constant sensation, maddening quiet, and her warm hands at his waist, nails barely scratching down his back.

“Nyota…” he gasps.

The pressure breaks, and suddenly she’s fucking at him shallowly until he becomes too concerned with breathing to tell her how good this is. He's open and stretched around the head of her dildo, getting pulled in every direction as she manipulates him until he cries out, a thin and airy sound. She makes it sting as she pushes deeper, angling to drag at every spot that could possibly feel good inside him.

She stops. “You’re so quiet. Why are you so quiet for me, huh? What would it take to make you scream?”

He doesn’t answer her question, and he can feel her fingers slip-sliding over the head of his cock as he feels her circle his entrance, stimulating skin already stretched open. He lets his head hang first, and then opens his legs a little more and pushes his forehead to the ground, mouth hanging open.

He can hear his own breath coming in pants and sobs, and he has nothing to hold on to, no place to root himself. The awareness of being filled starts to dig at him. Pleasure unravels in his stomach, sensory overload wrapped around him.

"Do you know what the really exciting thing about this is, Hikaru?" She pauses and laughs filthy-low as she speeds up, hips working, every stroke almost painful in its pleasure. "If I wanted to... If you let me? If your body let me? I could keep you like this for hours, hard and fast on hands and knees in a fucking bathroom. Look at you, not even able to speak because you want this so much. You won’t say it, but you don’t have to, just have to keep making those pretty sounds. C’mon, whimper a little more.”

Her hips do all the work for him, a steady rhythm in and out that gets more intense as time slips out of his grasp, every stroke impeccable. He's too busy making totally ridiculous noises to answer her, vision blurring as he struggles to paw up onto his hands and push her backward, show her how much he wants this. It throws them both for a loop, bodies in seemingly perpetual motion, grappling with fingers everywhere, nails digging in enough to leave marks in their wake.

“Bet I could turn you into the kind of cock-slut you turn all those boys into. Bet I could make you want this every time you saw me." She helps him with a careful arm up and around his middle, grinning in his ear as his mouth falls open at the change in position. "I could make you to beg, if I wanted."

Her skin is warm and soft against his back. She pushes at his hips, the curl of her nails holding him in place. "Fuck, _Nyota_."

She slams home inside him, smiling behind his back. He aches to turn around and see it. "You should always say my name that way."

His defenses melt and he starts working himself on her, muscles burning with exhaustion. " _Nyota_."

"Wanna see you ride me, next time," she whispers. "Want to watch you do all the work yourself. I know how hot it would be."

"What do you mean, next time?" he asks, his breath short and staggered, arms up and thrown back, fingers thrust into the softness of her skin.

"Got it in you?"

He wishes he'd reserved more of his composure to make a witty remark. He's ready to come, wouldn't even need anything around his dick, and he hangs his head and bares his teeth trying to find the strength to hold it off. Instead, he pulls off of her and turns around, pushing her down to the stone. It takes some work, reining in his control and slowing himself down, but it's worth it to see her face as he glides back down on her.

She stares, watching him take his pleasure from her. He can feel her eyes trace over his abdomen and the thick of his thighs as they lever back and forth to let him rise and fall. He pushes the observation aside, and gives into momentum, unable to fight the sensation.

“You look fucking sexy on my cock,” She hisses, the sentence jarring and ruthless. Nyota’s thumbs trace the crease of his hips, like she’s trying to read his skin.

He leans down, sucking at her bottom lip before kissing her, framing her face while his hips push back selfishly, watching her grin and lift her hips into the movement. He savors the friction, the way the material stretches him in a way skin and muscle never will.

They roll over again, her strokes becoming rough and messy as she gets comfortable. She grapples at his wrists to shove them above his head, keeping the kind of pace that he knows he'd use if he were doing this to her. She doesn't give him the room to breathe, jack-hammering until his eyes are rolling backward in his head and he's ready to come.

"You never needed my permission, Hikaru," she points out, because of course she fucking _knows_ , it’s what she fucking does. “Let me watch you come.”

He surges up, skin forced against skin as he gives in, vision going white just before his eyes fall closed. He shakes through the end, gasping for air his lungs can’t find as his body relaxes into the stone.

Her pace eases and her grip falls loose on his wrists, until he can slip a hand away and use it to curl around her body. He can tell she’s come too in the way she's panting, her whole body expanding and contracting for air in the circle of his arms. It makes sense with all that hard pressure on her clit, the way he’d crashed his hips down onto hers, always seeking more.

He groans when she tugs at his hair to haul him up. The way she kisses him is inescapable, almost cruel as she fucks her tongue into his mouth. Very much under her control, he's trapped until she lifts her mouth up and away, pulling out.

“You know, you’re so quiet when you come,” Nyota teases, her voice an intoxicating purr. “It’s amazing. You go all slack-jawed and wide-eyed like you don’t know what to do with yourself and at the last minute, the last little second, you give in. It’s like you know it’s wrong but you need it anyway.”

"Jesus fuck, Nyota," he gasps, rests his head in her neck. She whispers something to him again, circling her fingers against him and slipping back in to find his prostate one last time. He shakes and whimpers like he’s trying to get away. He can't even tell if she's speaking in English because she’s got him almost coming again, exhausted and happy. She takes mercy, leans down onto his shoulder and curls into his arms.

They stay there, laying together on hard and cold stone. He smiles lazily, her breath a rhythmic breeze on his neck.

She pulls away. He indulges in the loss, and misses her when she's gone.

 

 

 

Water showers are an indescribable luxury after years of sonic ones in the Academy, but the shower they share is utilitarian, standing under the spray to wash away dried sweat and come smeared down her thighs and across his stomach. There are a few chaste kisses, and the rumblings of something more, but he stops her, eyes closing.

"We should stop," he says, breathless, "before I die."

"You sure know how to give a girl a compliment, _Walter_."

He shoves at her jokingly. "I should have never told you that."

"It's okay," she assures. "I found out through Spock about a month before you'd told me."

He makes a face as she kisses him again and helps him scrub clean.

 

 

 

There's a lot of space between them in bed. After tonight’s events, the occurrence is utterly ridiculous, like two people lying on opposite sides of an ocean. It makes him uncomfortable even though he's focused on other things, chasing sleep as it hides behind memories of San Francisco, grinning faces of now-dead cadets and the spiraling Vulcan landscape, gripping at the sheet underneath him like it's the only thing that's keeping him alive.

He hears her whimper and he looks over, whispering, "Still awake?"

She groans and turns over to face him. "Can't sleep. Have I woken you?"

He tries to keep his eyes closed even though the lights are off. It doesn't work. She’s flopped over onto her back and he can see the outline of her profile when his eyes adjust. He murmurs, "No."

"It's hard for me, too."

He doesn't know if she means trying to sleep, or if she means thinking about living after Vulcan. Still, she fidgets and slides closer to him: body heat and points of contact that tingle with familiarity. He shivers from the cold air, and huddles in next to her. Her hair is warm, still moist from their shower and he buries his face in it, lost in the smell of artificial fruit.

"Do you want to talk?" he asks, holding her close.

She makes a bitter and empty sound. His face is awkwardly buried in her ear and cheek, shaking vibrating skin. "No."

He tastes salt slipping into his mouth, and tightens his grip around her. His eyes well up, little pools that threaten to run over as he holds on.

He wants to be strong for her as she cries. Tears fall down his face when he realizes he can't; too much of this pain is his own.

 

 

 

She wakes him up at five; a gentle shaking that brings the world into slow focus through eyes that hurt from crying too hard. A still-damp pillow under his cheek is a leftover relic of last night’s bittersweet end, and he hates everything about this. He grunts at her and rolls over, the emptiness between them ever-present even though she's close.

She tucks herself in behind him, and the rough fabric of her oversized shirt chafes on his back. The unwelcome texture makes him itch beside her. She fits her mouth at his ear.

"Watch the sunrise with me?"

"Did you ever get to sleep last night?" he asks.

"No," she says. "Did a lot of thinking, though."

"Thinking about making some coffee before waking me up, maybe?"

Her thumb traces his bottom lip. He doesn't think, letting his tongue curl around it to taste the strong and sweet liquid on her skin. He smiles against her palm.

"You're too good to me," he groans.

"While I'm glad you'd thank me for the favor and not assume that since I'm a woman making you things is what I'm supposed to do, don't think I haven’t drank half the pot myself."

"So good to me, Nyota," he says dryly. He turns to kiss her chastely. "Let me get some pants and I'll meet you out there."

Her voice wavers, "I… Sure, Sulu. That's fine."

He watches her from afar, looking at how she ambles over to the bench, sitting at the corner and tucking her legs onto the stone. He doesn't have to see her face; she's looking at the stone and it’s obvious she's somewhere else. The dogs bark, chasing each other around the yard, endless green grass that drops off to a view of the houses below and the low mountain across the way.

He walks over to her, bare feet against concrete roughed with age. He winces at the jarring sound, like he’s ruined something so beautiful about this scene.

"I miss her," she says, softly.

Hikaru stares at the mountain, green almost glowing with morning light, the scene triggering too many memories. "What happened to not talking about it?"

"We're still not talking about it," she says, turning to him. "It just... kept me up for a while."

"That happens," he sighs. "I miss her, too. I miss her a lot. Like I keep on expecting to turn around and see her there."

He leans his elbows on his knees when he sits, looks into the darkness of his coffee, looking at his murky reflection. He knows she's holding something from him; he can hear it in her voice. He stays quiet, curious about her reaction.

"I know you're still tired, it's just..." She tilts her head in thought, reminding him a little of Spock. "I didn't want to be alone."

"Don’t worry about it. It's okay," he says.

"No," she says. "I don't think it's okay at all."

He doesn't know what she's really talking about. "What's really worrying you? Gaila's part of it, but there's something else, isn't there?"

She shuts down, jaw firming, eyes closing. Panic floods him, and he wonders if she’ll never speak to him again, the way she stays quiet. The sun rises a little more, nudging into the corner of his vision. He looks over at her, and sees someone so tired and yet so beautiful to him, her frailty revealed in the downturned corners of her lips and the way her hand clamps onto the edge of the bench.

"You don't have to say anything," he says, softly. "I'm sorry."

"No, you should know," she sighs. "I need you to know."

"What?"

"Pike's report included my discovery, the distress call. The Academy offered me incentive to stay in San Francisco," she says. "The new accommodations were part of that incentive, a way of trying to get me to stay. I'm not sure about the Enterprise, not when I can get tenure in the Academy within a year or so."

The dogs bark off in the distance, two of them tumbling in a playful fight under the tree, scampering around each other. The littlest one starts to run back to the terrace, likely in search of food.

Nyota's admission explains a lot.

"It's a good offer," he says, carefully.

"It's a big compliment," she replies. “I mean, look at me, emotional because I get to choose between two dream jobs. That deserves so much sympathy, right?”

He shrugs, knowing better than to try derailing her self-deprecation. “I dunno. Both assignments appeal to different parts of you, and they’re equally important to you, last time I checked. So, I’m sure picking one isn’t simply choosing your favorite and never looking back, it’s turning away from something you love.”

She stays quiet. He feels like he’s stuffed his words into her mouth.

It's frustrating, how close she's sitting next to him and yet how far away she is. Hikaru's unsure he can offer anything to bring her back or change her mind, no matter how much he wants her in space with him. They brush against each other shoulder-to-shoulder, and he freezes, wondering if the contact will do more harm than good.

He's never ached for boundaries with her more, wanting to make sure he doesn’t make her decision harder. He's also never ached for the absence of those boundaries in the way he does now, wanting to comfort and support her. His stomach drops, and fear radiates through his body. His stomach tightens, his breathing stutters in a careful fragile moment.

He knows it. He’s going to lose her, too.

"So, yeah. I have to make up my mind when I go back, and I... I'm conflicted," she sighs.

"I'm sure you'll be able to live with it, whatever you choose," he says, but it doesn't sound friendly at all. He takes another long drink of coffee in hopes that it will shut him up, or at least make him more helpful.

"I don't want you to think that this decision is the only reason why I came with you or the only reason why we..."

She doesn't finish the sentence.

He takes another sip of coffee, and settles into the knowledge that the intimacy on this trip was a cash-out, something she wanted to do before they parted ways. The revelation stings, and he prepares to add her name to the roster of people he’ll never see again, the thought of hugs and handshakes or any contact at all falling through his fingertips like sand.

When he looks at her again, she's tying her hair into a ponytail, sitting up. Hikaru sees the change, can tell she's gone back to Uhura instead of Nyota. Watching her preform such a simple action makes him feel helpless.

The dog comes up to the bench, almost pleading with her to be lifted. She reaches down, takes it into her arms and smiles softly as it barks at her, little tail blithely wagging. He's sure it would follow her back to San Francisco, if it could. It always looks so happy in her arms, like it knows it's going to get doted on. Uhura spoils it, cradling it in her thighs and smiling sadly.

"It's okay. I get it," he says. It isn't anywhere near enough. "You don't have to say anything else. Doesn't mean I can't miss you, though."

"I haven't made up my mind. You don't know anything more than I do," she says, idle and even-toned. He falls quiet, listens to the steady in and out of his breath and tries to find it within himself to stay calm. The sun's high in the sky.

Fuck morning, he wants to go back to bed. This new day already sucks.

"Hey, come back," he says, spontaneously nudging her with his shoulder. It shocks him as much as it shocks her, the way he breaks through that space that seems to always sit between them. "Stay with me, Nyota, just this once."

"Five years is a mighty long time," she says without thinking. That’s not what he meant.

"Ten days is a mighty long time."

She looks at him like she's trying to analyze him. "It's numbing, Hikaru. I just... I don't know if I'm ready for space. I thought I was until we dropped out of warp."

"And you think my stomach didn't drop when we hit Vulcan? C'mon," he says. "You're one of the hardest working people I know. We both know how much the Enterprise needs you."

"I know," she nods. "It... became very real at that point. It wasn't simulation anymore; it wasn't a final or some stupid cooked up scenario. It wasn't programmed; it was real. And maybe... maybe that's not where I want to be, right now. Maybe that’s not what I need."

He laughs humorlessly, thinking of how many simulations were about maintaining control in the face of ruin. People weren't behind a panel somewhere, looking in and grading how well any of them did.

The truth was, what happened at Vulcan wasn't the kind of test any of them had come in contact with before, and Starfleet doesn’t make simulations for conversations like these.

She hangs her head, and starts laughing with him. He can hear the heartbreak in her voice: it's familiar, a tone he knows is in his, too. To take their minds off this would mean taking their minds off the choices they've made, and the consequences they've endured.

Those consequences killed Gaila. He's not sure it's a good idea to ignore them any longer.

"You should do whatever you believe is right for you, but if you're asking my opinion, there's not a single officer in the fleet that deserves senior bridge duty on the Enterprise the way you do," he says, softly. "The Academy won't know how lucky they are."

Her fingers brush his wrist and the touch sets off a thousand newly minted memories of being pressed down between her and the cold floor, memories of what it feels like to be at her whim. She lingers, like she's remembering the same thing.

"Thank you for the kind words," she says, "but I'm sure they’re quite aware of my talents."

She's not crying. Secretly, he wants to do it for her.

"I think it's time for both of us to go back to sleep."

She doesn't look like she agrees with him, but gets up and walks away first.

 

 

 

They huddle together close in bed, and she yanks the covers over their heads, not bothering with the curtains. It's only then that he presses his lips to her forehead and whispers that everything's going to work out just fine.

"I know," she whispers back. It sounds certain in a way he was sure she wasn't. “It’s still nice to hear it from you.”

Behind his eyelids, he’s spinning out of control.

 

 

 

When they wake again, the sun is shining right into the room. He takes the opportunity to kiss her awake, trying his best to divorce the act from the suggestion of romance by sticking to her cheeks and forehead, toying with the hair at the nape of her neck. Her eyes are red when she opens them and looks at him, but she only pauses for a moment before meeting his lips in a chaste, closed mouth kiss.

"Are you going to regret this, when we get back to San Francisco?" he asks.

"Why would I, Hikaru? I was going to be alone on leave, remember? I was going to amble to all the tourist traps of San Francisco, and curl up in my room for a week, wishing I had decided to go home for a while and think about how I might not have come back. I'm with someone who cares about me and my wellbeing and that's more than I could have asked for, honestly."

"But..."

"You need to stop reading all those antiquated romance novels," she interrupts. "I'm not a Jane Austen heroine, here."

The remark thankfully breaks the tension. He ducks into the cloth of her shirt, laughing bashfully. She raises his head with careful fingers on his cheek, staring at him again.

"Who are you, then?" he says, amused.

"Academic by day, explorer by night," she grins, stealing a kiss. He's thankful for the silly colloquialism, curling around her. She gives him unspoken permission, closing her eyes and licking at his bottom lip. She whispers soft words in his ear, Vulcan, soft vowels and sugar-sweet inflection. He trembles, listening to the lilt in her voice. He knows she's asking for something she wants, and it's not the same thing she wanted before. There's no space here for wit, repartee or power-play. She wants him.

They kick off the covers and abandon what little they'd been wearing. He tries not to stare: now's not the time to obsess but the sunlight shining into the room shows him places on her body he longs to touch and taste. He thinks of the curve of her thighs and the flat of her stomach, the acres of gorgeous skin there for him to touch, taste and memorize. She looks like she's the doing the same, like she's trying to memorize how he looks in front of her.

He blinks, takes a slow breath, and reaches for a condom.

She lifts her head to suck at the curve of his collarbone, dragging across it in a long line like she's trying to find something, and curls in to whisper in his ear. "Slow this time."

"Slow," he agrees.

 

 

 

There is no Academy or Enterprise here.

Hikaru forgets everything but the gentle rocking of his hips and how warm Nyota is, her legs hooked around his waist. Her fingers collect at his shoulders, palms flat and warm across his collarbones and neck.

Her body is the final frontier and the only exploration that takes place is punctuated by skin to skin, the brush of lips. The dance of bodies rolling across smooth white cloth defies description in its familiarity.

They’re silent, save for soft breath and the occasional sigh. Anything else would wreck this, intimacy built haphazardly and meant to convey so much without the help of words they could never genuinely bring themselves to say.

The world stands still inside this bed, as cheesy and unbelievable as it sounds. There’s nothing else in relation to this, nothing can compare to closing his eyes and breathing her in, his lips dragging across her chest.

In a moment of stillness, Hikaru wishes this could never end. For both of their sakes.

 

 

 

Even though they've spent day in bed, Nyota takes the dogs out for a walk and goes to get some take-away before sunset. Hikaru considers offering to go with her, but the dogs are enough to keep her company and he's sure she could use the alone time to think. Perhaps he could use the alone time, too.

While she's gone, he waters the plants and takes some notes on the ones he's been helping along. After he's done in the greenhouse, he configures the katana, and practices his stances in the backyard. He prefers to do this alone, finding the place he goes to is too intimate when nobody's sparring with him. He doesn't like it when people watch this: the way he closes his eyes and lets his feet and wrists do the work, dancing with his sword against an imaginary opponent.

He stands barefoot so he can feel the grass under his feet and bends his knees just enough, careful not to slide. He acts like he's playing for keeps, imagining all the places to strike and attacking them in order, high to low and back again. The sword follows, feeling like an extension of his arm while he exhales, letting himself get into this with flourish and technique. He gets messy, a little dangerous. He needs it; it’s safe to lose himself in this.

He abandons proper form completely for a second, taking the weight of the sword. He stops thinking, adrenaline surging through him. It goes to his head and he takes risks he'd never allow himself to take in the heat of competition or battle unless he were really desperate, giving himself space to practice parries and thrusts and altered grips on the handle, swinging the sword clear and high over his head, letting it tear down to land near his side.

"Wow," he hears her voice behind him, turns around to see her standing on the patio. "You really do look like a pirate king when you do that."

“Will you stop with that?” He asks.

“You have a sword in your hand, of course I’ll stop teasing you. I’ll be honest, though, a touch of eyeliner, some leather boots, one of those absurdly ruffled shirts. I think we both know you’d make an insanely sexy pirate.”

"Could you not give yourself any more ideas?" he asks, then takes in the fact that he's not wearing a shirt, his hair's flopping in his face and soaking with sweat, and he's probably been stabbing into the air in a way that looks entirely too feral for a civilized sport like fencing.

"No," she says, playfully. "Don’t mind me, just admiring your swordsmanship. Remind me to never challenge you to a duel."

"Who needs to stop reading romance novels now? I’m not going to change my middle name to ‘bodice ripper.’"

She laughs at that, casual and a little breathy, "Like I own a bodice for you to rip.”

"I'm sure we could find other things for me to rip off you if you really want it that badly," he shrugs.

She snorts, the moment of heat and temptation over. "I prefer to be particular about my fantasies, thank you."

He raises an eyebrow at that, “You’ll be able to find anything in San Francisco, if you really want to.”

She leers, hands on her hips. “Changing the subject from lingerie shopping and antiquated gender performance, I brought dinner."

"Good. I’m hungry," he says, retracting the katana, snapping the safety into place and sticking the handle into the back of his pants. He grabs her and attempts to wipe his face off on her shirt. She bats him away, giggling.

"Why are we friends?" she groans.

His lips curl into a smile as he goes to get some water.

 

 

 

Back when Hikaru was little, it was all the rage to try teaching the grand slam of Romance languages to children at a very young age. All he has to show for this 'education' are the dirty limericks and colorful curses of informal Portuguese and the melodies of 20th century French nursery rhymes as familiar as his own name.

Hikaru can count the languages he's good at on one hand: Federation Standard, American English, and Baja Spanish. He knows others: a decent bit of Filipino from his childhood and scraps of Japanese from people who have insisted that California can never possibly be his true home.

A lot of people ask if he knows Japanese, especially people who do not know him well thanks to the Academy. It’s a pet peeve if there ever was one, ripe with confused and offensive references to any practice of ‘the Orient’, relying upon Anime colloquialisms, Sun Tsu passages, talk of Confucius, and the ever popular jokes about Bruce Lee. Hikaru always paints a sterile smile over his face and refuses to answer beyond a simple and firm ‘I am American.’ Things are better, that way.

In a moment of vulnerability, he’d only ever indulged the curiosity of one person: Nyota.

Her tongue wrapped around words he couldn’t understand save for the formality of her tone, as if she’d known what a gift his frank answer had been. When he’d asked her what she meant in response, she’d reverted back to English, leaning forward in her seat as if to indulge him in a secret all her own.

“It means ‘If you would like, someday, I will teach you more,’” She’d said.

The memory’s edges have sharpened considerably. He knows that day will not come soon.

 

 

 

The wine from dinner makes the kisses they share warm and sweet. When she whispers words he doesn't know in his ear, he simply holds onto her hips and tilts his head, closing his eyes and listening. Nyota's speaking to him in Orion. He can tell from the familiar accent, and the way she's crooning it. Her voice becomes throaty like she's telling him something insanely dirty, straddling him on the couch, her hands curved around the back of his neck.

Instead of thinking about all the possible things she could be saying, his imagination takes him back to Gaila. He remembers the ever-present smile and the eager laugh, the way her fingers would always tap idly at the corner of her PADD in class. When they started hanging out after study sessions, she'd tell him the most ridiculously dirty jokes and inform him of how many different engineering-related double entendres there really were, doing impersonations of the faces people would make for her when they came.

"Wait, you two went on a date?" Gaila asked him after she set him up with Nyota.

"Judging by the somewhat awkward morning after conversation, I'd say yes," he'd nodded.

"Wait, you also had sex?"

"Wasn't that the point?" he'd asked her. "I mean, you did set us up, I totally thought you paired us off so that we would eventually fu..."

"No! That was totally not the point," she said. "It’s not like I was expecting for you to assume that because it was me asking you to meet her, I meant for you to have sex with her. I want other things than sex you know, including your happiness.”

“I know that. I’m not that much of an asshole,” He’d reassured. “It wasn’t as if I’d gone in thinking I was going to score last night. Half of the time I thought she was just going to turn around and walk away.

“I totally fail at this whole introducing friends thing, and I'm really, really sorry. I didn’t think you guys were going to think it was a blind date. Was it at least enjoyable?"

"I'm sure if you ask her politely you'll be able to experience it for yourself," he had offered without thinking. She’d raised an eyebrow in challenge, a dare to ask her for details and oh, that was the kind of dangerous territory that Hikaru was attracted to like a moth to flame. "I mean, yes, it was great. A bit more high octane than I thought it was going to be, but that wasn't her fault."

"Meaning you two bitched at each other about who was going to do what and who was going to sit back and take it," she laughed. "I thought that you were going to realize that you got along well and that you would be good friends."

"Really?"

"Yes, really! I didn't expect that either of you were going to go all the way," she'd said. "Oh, wait, you didn't get that far because you're both the same person."

"Does that make me narcissistic?" he'd asked sarcastically. "I mean, I'm willing to look like a lot of things, but ‘a narcissist' isn’t anywhere near the top of my list. I already have enough people thinking I’m a jock."

The incredulous look in her eyes had been far too amusing, and the two of them had broken into laughter.

Here and now, however, Nyota is watching him with concern. "Hey, are you all right? You drifted off a bit, there."

"I think I'm fine," he says, slipping her fingers into his.

"Hey," she says, carefully. "Stay with me. Just this once."

If there's one thing Hikaru will miss about Gaila, it's her energy, buzzing high and fast. If there's one thing he's going to miss about Nyota, it's her endless compassion, the knack she has for wanting to understand.

He comes close to Nyota, his lips barely brushing against hers. She moans and tugs him down onto the couch.

"What are we, Hikaru?" she sighs.

He pauses, tries to think about what she means in the question, and decides to play it safe. "We're, uh, people?"

"Hikaru," she says, carefully, "what are we doing, here? You have arrangements and I may have arrangements and I don't want this to put those arrangements in jeopardy. I don't want it to hurt anything, and maybe..."

He turns on his side, looks at her. "Maybe what?"

"Maybe I am worried about regrets. Maybe I'm worried about a lot of things."

He smiles at her, keeping his space even though it seems paradoxical. "What do you want us to be? Do you want us to be anything?"

"I'm your friend, Hikaru. I'll always want that," she says, but there's a sparkle in her eye even though her tone is flat. He smiles at her and lets her continue. "I just don't want our friendship, or how we are around each other to be compromised."

"I'm shocked."

"Shut up, I'm not done. I'm your friend, but... I think I want this, and I don't want to lock myself down or put a label on it. It's logical and mutually beneficial."

"Does this mean you're sticking with Enterprise?"

"I haven't made a decision," she says, pained. He tries not to kick himself for that. One good fuck isn't going to change Nyota Uhura's mind on anything. "And I'd like to think that our friendship would not be dependent upon my choice."

"Never. Not by a long shot."

"Well, then. Logical and mutually beneficial."

"Seeing as we're talking specifics, is Spock going to choke me on the bridge because I'm your friend with benefits?"

"That depends on a set of variables that are presumably beyond my control," she says, deadpan. "What, feeling guilty?"

"No," he says primly. "I just like being alive and fully able to breathe, is all."

She laughs, an honest to god laugh with its hazy smoothness and a dazzling smile. It's the first time he's heard that laugh in a long time, certainly since Gaila. "Thanks for killing the moment here. You know what I'm saying."

"Are you asking me to be your wingman, Nyota?" he asks. "Because, I gotta say, you sure know how to make a girl feel special."

She shoves him against the back of the sofa, laughing. "Like we'd ever be good on a pull together."

"Wingmen do tons of other things together, you know."

"They do?" she asks. "Like what?"

It's a softball question, like the kind in old romance movies Gaila used to love making them watch. Still, he teases, not giving in so quickly. "Hang out? Watch movies? Play cards? Eat?"

"We just did that. Are you drunk enough to be hungry again? Should we make a late night run the way we used to?"

He debates saying yes, but he doesn't know this place well enough for the two of them not to look like two newbies drunkenly whooping up a storm in hopes of fish tacos or Orion split roast or Vindaloo. He misses late nights spent with spicy tea and hookah, rose-smelling smoke and darkly seductive music, the curl of budding friendship between Nyota, Gaila and him.

He wishes he could steal a little bit of that naiveté back.

“No,” he shakes his head. “I’m not hungry. I’ll just have some more of this, instead.

He hooks his hands around Nyota's back and twists his fingers into the fabric of her shirt. She smiles at him again, open and wide, as he traces the curve of her neck.

He kisses her, and gets lost in the feeling again.

 

 

 

On the platform, Hikaru gets a twist in his gut. He pours over everything that they could have possibly done in the house, written notes and laundered sheets. Every used dish has been cleaned, the plants watered, the dogs fed. He thinks for a second about whether they got all the condom wrappers, but that's not the issue.

He misses space. The air's too fresh and the gravity's too real here and he knows it. He realizes he wants to be out there, shacked up in a tin can. His life up there has evolved into a testosterone driven sausage fest, but he gets to drive it, and that counts for something. That counts for a lot.

When he turns around, Nyota's gone. He lets his mind turn over at that, lets himself wonder for an insane minute if the last few days have been a fever dream. It could be the wishful thinking of a man that has had a streak of unfathomably good luck. For all he knows, this could be true meaning of temptation, a questioning of his own faith and sanity.

She walks back to where he’s standing and smiles.

"I wanted a cup of coffee," she says. "Got you one, too. Black with sugar?"

She slips the cup into his hand, and he grins at the first taste. "You're a goddess, Uhura."

"I'm considerate, that's what I am."

They stand there, and he knows he shouldn't ask her again about the decision she's been trying to make; it's not like she hasn't thought about it the whole time she's been with him here. He's desperately curious, and almost hates himself for letting it show all over his face. Almost.

"I'm not telling you," she says, happily.

"But that means you've made up your mind, right?"

"No, it doesn't," she says. "All I'm saying is that whenever I do make my final decision, you'll know."

"You have more important people to tell, and I’ll hear it eventually," he says. "Important people like to gossip."

She stops for a second like she's choosing her words carefully. "I... have to tell my family, first. And perhaps go talk with Gaila."

He smiles at that, thinking about how she'll sit primly in the memorial hall at the Academy and whisper the news while sliding her fingers over Gaila's name imprinted into the marble. He knows he needs to go do the same, press his fingers into so many names of childhood friends that are now only remembered by stone, as cold and immobile as death itself.

“I think I kind of want to be surprised," he says. "Don't tell me at all."

He knows he'll be disappointed if she isn't in the shipyard, and her name isn't on the roster for the mission. He just doesn't want her to see it.

The shuttle touches down, and she pitches her empty cup into a nearby compost bin as she picks up her bag. The doors open, and he can see her return back to the same tension so familiar to both of them, perfect posture and determined, professional eyes. He stands up, and watches as she gathers her hair and twists it into a bun. He touches her stomach, stilling her where she stands. He grits his teeth, and hopes the gesture isn’t inappropriately intimate.

"Thank you for coming with me, Nyota. Really."

She smiles. "I'm glad I did, Hikaru. I hope you don't think less of me because of my motivations for coming, and I hope you don't regret what we did."

She kisses him, long and slow like it's already illicit or like she knows it's the last time she's going to be able to be with him this way.

"Never," he whispers. She slides her lips over the cut of his cheek, caressing his skin as she holds him. They walk like that together, bags over their shoulders and arms around each other, wrapped up in each other.

"You read way too many romance novels, you know that?"

He laughs. Whatever they have will be enough.

 

 

 

While he's packing, Hikaru finds an old picture, ink on glossy paper, Polaroid-style. The novelty of the printed picture had been quaint when it was taken, now it's just another thing that shows its age.

The picture is of the three of them, squished together in the corner of a couch during a themed drag party at the officer's club downtown. Gaila and Nyota looked like mob bosses from 20th century organized crime movies, tight pinstripe suits flashing cleavage and hair styles that tuck long waves into short updos, locks hanging under fedoras. Hikaru had been standing between them with his arms slung around their shoulders. He’d went as Marilyn Monroe, platinum blond wig and funny little mole, billowing white dress and replicated fur, crimson lipstick and fake breasts.

He remembers this night, how they'd spent so much time shopping for a gown and coaching him until he could get the caricature just right. There was his still-horrible Norma Jean impression, endlessly breathy falsetto renditions of 'I Wanna Be Loved By You' only made worse by wine, beer, and shots of sparkling Sambucca that had been bought for him by several potential suitors at the bar. Everyone wanted to see Marilyn get trashed.

He realized halfway through the night and after his third round of gin that it might have been smarter to dress as Audrey Hepburn.

When he finds the dress hanging in the back of his closet, Hikaru remembers that night’s drunken stagger on the way back to his loft. He remembers Nyota using all of her strength to hold him up on one side, Gaila on the other.

The fabricated silk still is soft and conditioned, the sensation a comfort and a memento of a night with friends he'll never see again. The thought is bitter, painful.

A pang of guilt cuts through him; it was so easy for the three of them to turn into good friends before, and now every memory has an echo of loss, the most stable pillar someone he'll never see again. There's still a good chance Nyota's staying in San Francisco, and while he's going to have new interactions with Jim and Bones, or Pavel and Scotty, he’ll never have the kind of adventures San Francisco brought ever again.

His time with Nyota and Gaila will always be particularly different. It will be known for its tight shirts and high heels, sharp suits and careless laughter. It’ll compose itself in the times he's posed as a boy Friday to get them out of situations filled with morons of all genders, and the overwhelming happiness of having schedules line up for the first time in weeks. He'd been the fellow TA who Nyota could sit with over lunch, bitching about students endlessly. He’d been the gentleman that walked Gaila back to the dorms after midnight, joking with her about being another easily manipulated man ready to do whatever she asked.

His other friends had warned him of the rumors about Orion women and their pheromones. They had joked that he was joining the hunt for Uhura’s affections to his own eventual demise. As much as he loved and appreciated the time spent with his other friends, people who shared histories with him and passed in and out of his life like people stepping onto a dance floor or competition mat, he’s seen memories of his escapades with Galia and Nyota like they’re scars, battle wounds of rumor mills and gossip tables.

Their differences had brought them together and kept them there.

It was far from thankless work. There was always the sense of walking out of a club knowing everyone was watching the asshole who seduced the two hottest girls at the bar, and the stunned silence that would happen whenever the three of them entered a room. Uhura had been a gracious date during times when Hikaru’s current conquests had crashed and burned and he’d been petty enough to want them seething with jealousy, and days when Galia had extracted him from his studies under the guise of teaching him dances from her childhood, trying to divorce painful memories from ones she needed, the two of them deducing who she was and who she could be from them. There had been the times Gaila cooked for him while he was sick, and times Nyota tried to learn fencing so he could get his instructor certification. Those instances were swollen over with pride, as central to his years at Starfleet as his career or the lovers he'd taken.

He wishes he had a picture of how they'd looked the morning after that particular drag ball, stripped down to underwear and piled into his bed. The picture would have been a downright scandal at the time, proof of rumors that he’d been constantly maintaining a rather clandestine triad. Clothes had been messily abandoned along the floor up to the bed, glasses of water left full thanks to half-hearted attempts to sober up, drunkenly chaste kisses and bodies wrapped into each other in hopes of siphoning warmth.

He aches for the memories of that particular morning, of being so hung over that he’d woken up convinced he’d become a girl thanks to those sadistic stick-on breasts. He remembers the sun flooding his loft, Gaila's slim fingers spread over his chest and the curve of Nyota’s back while she was turned away, curled up into herself in sleep. He had imagined the warmth of her skin that morning, his eyes focused on the clasp of her bra, and pictured the worried glance she'd give when he invited her back in, singing warmly in her ear.

He's always wished that he had reached out to Nyota, then. He’s always regretted the fact that he didn’t curl his hand around her shoulder or nudge her awake.

The picture ends up in the bottom of his bag, the dress in a box at the bottom of Megumi's closet. It's better off that way.

In retrospect, he missed his golden opportunity that morning. He notes the realization bitterly, and then locks it away.

 

 

 

The shipyard is always an uncomfortable experience, high-priority documents being beamed from PADD to PADD, personal identification codes being whispered in every ear, clearances getting checked and shifts being battled over. When he finally gets a projected ship roster, she's not on it.

However, she is standing by a shuttle, arms crossed like she’s sizing the ramp up.

"Fancy meeting you here," he says.

"Sulu," she says, looking serious.

"Here to see me off?" he asks lightly.

"What do you think?"

He bites his lip, turning the possibility over in his mind and arrives at the same answer he's been getting every time he thinks about it. "I think the Academy will love you."

"I'm sure they would." The curve of her lips tell him how wrong he is. He takes a minute, brushes aside the curt burn of the statement, how patronizing it is, and realizes he’s been wrong about her, again. She beams, "I picked the Enterprise."

His mouth hangs open for a second in wonder before he realizes she isn’t yanking his chain. "Really? No worries about what happened at Vulcan or missing tenure at the Academy or wanting to be one of those people who don't know how close they came to annihilation?"

She raises a finger, glaring at him. The gesture is so well practiced between them that he smiles and falls silent. It brings back memories of absolute happiness, lunches and after dinner drinks, Gaila's red hair spilling over Uhura's back as she rests her head on Nyota's shoulder in the back of a booth. His heart might just be caught in his throat, even though he wouldn’t ever admit it.

"I worry about all of those things, and I don't need to be reminded of them," she says, prim. "Tenure will be there when we get back; it won’t go anywhere the Enterprise is built to go, and I figure I could do with some time off the ground.”

He can hear the relief in his own voice. “I’m glad you’re coming, then. You’ve never been the kind to sit an adventure out.”

“I also decided I'll tell Spock about what happened in Portland. If he comes back. I owe it to him," She says.

"He's going to kill me, isn't he?" Hikaru asks. So much for all that space exploration and assorted bad-assery he's been fantasizing about. He should figure out who gets the sword when he dies, anyway.

"You're the helmsman. You pilot his ship. Killing you would be illogical," she deadpans. She looks down the shipyard row, at crates being packed and people milling like a marketplace. "Besides, he knows of your affinity for swords."

"You gonna start with the pirate shit again?"

"I mean, we xenolinguists are walking PR mills. With the help of a few well-placed rumors, you know," She smiles, leaning in closer. "That Sulu kid? I heard he carries this old knife he won in a bare-knuckle boxing match and that the last person who quoted protocol to him about it lost his tongue."

"Could you not?" he asks. "And besides, why would I win the knife in a bare-knuckle boxing match? Isn’t the point of anything bare-knuckle to be free of weapons?"

"Nobody would try crossing a man that badass, that’s the point. It’s just an open and standing offer," she says quietly. The banter’s amusing and comforting and proof that everything will work out in the end.

"It's good to have an offer like that out on the table. It’s just a bit premature," he says, simply. She looks at him and laughs. "It's probably a bad idea to turn me into Chuck Norris within the first year. Starfleet would still care, in the first year."

"I hadn't thought about that, actually," she says. "It's a good idea. 'Hikaru Sulu destroyed the periodic table because he only recognizes the element of surprise' sounds a lot like you."

"I do not only recognize the element of surprise. I'm fond of beryllium, too," he says.

She laughs at him, looking down at her shoes. "Why do I even bother to put up with you?"

"You know it's because you absolutely adore my sense of humor."

“I’ll miss it,” she says.

“It?” he asks.

“San Francisco. Earth,” she shrugs. “That coffee house down on Columbus, that lingerie shop on Watson, the bridge.”

“It’s going to be hard, sweetheart. I’ll miss it, too.”

The nickname fits well; Gaila had always been fond of the word.

She stops smiling, and takes a shaky breath. "Hikaru."

"Yes?"

She bites at her lip and looks away from him uncomfortably, shifting her weight. "Say my name like that again. Like you did in Oregon? Like you meant it?"

He looks up at her, studying the concern on her face. The uniform she's wearing is brilliant red as it catches the sunlight. He wants to touch her, ground her in something other than herself, even if it's bad form in the middle of the shipyard.

"Sometimes we do things because we know we're vulnerable," she continues, picking at a nail, the black polish peeling at the corners, " I need to be sure of something, anything right now."

He leans down, conspiratorially close, pressing his forehead to hers. He knows what he's asking her for. " _Nyota_."

She's more relaxed than she'd been in the days since Vulcan, biting at her lip and trying not to reach up and kiss him right there. She stands, arms framing his shoulders as he slides his hands around her waist, and grins. The allowance of touch is a thank you, more sincere than words would be able to describe. Perhaps she’s found some kind of freedom in the scope of this decision. Her fingers trace the grooves of his shoulder blades through his uniform, sliding down his arms as she slips out of his grasp. It breaks his heart to feel how the connection of her fingertips on his separates.

The moment ruptures down the middle with his unending curiosity.

“Wait, there’s a lingerie shop on Watson?!”

Her smile is breathtaking. “As far as I’m aware, you can’t really be called a bodice ripper unless you have a bodice to rip. I think I found one you’ll like, if you ever get to see it.”

There go those completely unbecoming noises again. “You know I’m flying your ship, right? It’s a bad idea to give me a heart attack before we even start.”

"I'll see you, Hikaru," she smiles, and he watches as she walks away.

He doesn't move until he's registered that she's walked in the direction of the Starfleet shuttle to the station, not the direction of the Academy dorms.

Huh. Wow.

 

 

 

Spock returns to the ship, and Hikaru can almost feel Nyota's relaxation as she takes her post the first time, sitting at her station. In the corner of his eye, he can see her turning, watching him and Spock at their stations, and while he can’t hear her wistful sigh, he knows it’s there. He's happy for her, wouldn't dare be anything else; he's always found Nyota's happiness to be palpable, contagious.

After that, the first week on the Enterprise without the grasp of crisis is a lot like the first few days of any school year in the Academy. There's the delirious stagger from nights of drinking alcohol that's been smuggled on board and conversations of mechanics and shift schedules, the smell of artificial citrus cleaner and the shine of glossy white fixtures everywhere, too-blue light reflecting off the corners of every room.

His bed still feels alien. His quarters are too quiet. The polymer on the walls is too slick, too new under his fingertips. He doesn't know what to do with himself.

It's like he's been given a brand new toy and finds just enough to be afraid about, wondering what the first few scuffs and the first chips of paint will say of his character.

The picture of Galia, Nyota and him at the drag party sits next to a picture of his family on vacation in Kyoto and a picture of his Academy fencing team, taped crudely in a row at the bottom of the mirror in his side of the bathroom he shares with Pavel.

Sometimes, when he dreams of uncontrolled falling and the crunch of broken alloy, he gets up and walks into the bathroom. He can’t help but stare at the pictures, and goes back to sleep comforted by the presence of those memories.

 

 

 

Three weeks into the mission Jim comes to him, seeking some place to step out of his duties for a while. Hikaru decides it's a good time to inform him of what happened in Portland.

He plays it simple, even if he is a bit cruel. He directs Jim to disrobe and kneel on the bed, makes Jim cite codes of conduct and fraternization policies before he even touches him, an impromptu interrogation. He tells Jim to clasp his hands together behind his back before shoving him backward, finding Jim's already prepared himself, loose and wet. He fucks Kirk with two fingers, makes him recite regs again, interrupting with murmurs and whispers of what he's done, how he's fucked Nyota filthy-slow and pulled the most gorgeous noises from her, how good she tastes.

He understands Jim's affinity for anything as commanding as Nyota Uhura, so he's put some thought into this, made sure to only describe in sensation and allow for no question about history. He gives snippets of information designed to push Jim's buttons, half-lies that are accompanied by just the right stimulation. He does not divulge anything that would reveal the adoration he has for Nyota, or the intimacy that existed in the spaces of dance clubs, restaurants, backyards and bathrooms. Jim sucks the information up like a sponge, not moving until Hikaru makes him.

When Hikaru finally thrusts in to the hilt, he whispers, "Perhaps if we ask her nicely, she'll let you lick her boots next time I fuck her."

Jim's reaction is perfect, writhing and angry-aware, bucking up into every stroke. Hikaru fucks him hard with his hands holding onto Jim’s wrists like reigns while Jim’s trying to hold onto the visual. Hikaru is thankful for this, thankful for the reestablished contact when space's solitude has rocked them all to a lull, teeth bared and sunken into the flesh of Jim’s shoulder, holding him in place.

He's also thankful for the chance to divide the things he got from the sex and separate them away from the things he got from simply being around Uhura, seeing her baby those dogs and eat burgers and sit in wet grass, writing notes by hand. He doesn't have to describe the tears that fell down her cheeks silently at the mention of Vulcan, or the fact that they've been around each other enough that she knows how he takes his coffee. These are things Jim does not need to hear, and these are things Hikaru’s glad he does not have to reveal.

Jim comes like a gunshot without any touch or permission, his moans becoming more urgent and his body shaking with need. Hikaru’s not sure if any sort of punishment would be able to fit such a gorgeous crime. Instead, he simply adds salt to the wound, pushing Jim down, riding him hard. He teases Kirk about coming so soon, and jokes about all the things he knows Kirk will have to endure before he could ever consider getting Nyota for himself.

Hikaru comes thinking about his captain and one of his best friends in bed together, the vision of skin on skin and the pleasure of watching Kirk get completely stripped of all his control. Nyota would enrapture Jim brilliantly, bark out orders and present no room for them to be disobeyed, tell him how much he lacked control when he was around her and how that would never do.

In the afterglow, Jim sees the picture in Hikaru’s bathroom, and Hikaru catches him staring, brows furrowed. Jim asks him where they are after the trip to Portland and how Nyota's doing after losing Gaila, knowing they were close friends. Gaila and Jim ended callously, a fight over some words that did not take into account Gaila's heritage, among other things. Gaila had curled up and sobbed on Hikaru’s couch in sorrow for all of an afternoon before calling Jim Kirk the biggest asshole she'd ever met and starting to move on.

Hikaru carefully chooses the second question to answer, and offers that Nyota's doing the best she can. Jim nods, thankful.

There’s some ribbing about Hikaru being an excellent drag queen, Jim insisting he’s learned something strategically critical.

“You never know when you’re going to need a katana-wielding drag queen on the away team,” Jim shrugs.

“Just give me fair warning about it, okay? Shaving my legs is a bitch, and if I have to go out in one of those dresses…”

Jim grins, “I trust you’d clean up well enough on short notice. I'll gladly help if you need an extra pair of hands, if you want to consider that a fair trade. It’s the makeup I’d be worried about, personally. None of the women on this ship are loyal to wearing the kind of eyeshadow that’d match your uniform. It's a real pity, y'know. The gold would bring out your eyes."

This is easy, Hikaru thinks as he shoves Jim. Right when he plays it up in classic 'Jim Kirk' style, Hikaru pulls him back so they align mouth-to-mouth, passion and anticipation intertwined. As the joke tires and they separate to breathe, Jim says a few words about hoping that any sort of relationship with Uhura would not spill over to professional duties, or present a tense situation with Spock on the bridge. Hikaru simply rolls his eyes and shakes his head, reassuring his captain. While there have been hints in the past few weeks that Nyota would like to continue spending time with him behind closed doors, he’s not expecting anything. Besides, both of them are professionals and nothing’s going to change that anytime soon, unless Spock goes postal.

Kirk lets it drop, and slips into bed. "I heard something interesting yesterday about you, by the way."

Hikaru takes the bait, "Yeah?"

"That you destroyed the periodic table because the only thing you believe in is the element of surprise. Couple of guys in engineering, asking me about that sword fight on the drill," Jim shrugs, half hearted. "You might have to go down there and set them straight."

Hikaru laughs until his stomach starts to hurt and he almost runs out of air. He's glad Jim does not ask what's so funny; Hikaru hates lying in order to keep inside jokes private.

 

 

 

"I told Spock," Nyota says, one day over lunch.

Hikaru's brows furrow melodramatically. "Okay, tell it to me straight. How long have I got to live and who's piloting the ship after I die?"

She tisks. "It's not like that. I mean, he was perplexed and surprised at first but then he, well, you know."

She fumbles for words and ends up motioning all around her head. He knows Spock asked to meld and she gave him what he wanted. Logical and mutually beneficial, Hikaru thinks. He wonders what that must feel like, being taken so fully, wonders if it's like someone moving around inside your head and showing up in every memory.

"What happened after that?" he asks.

"He was still surprised, but not as perplexed, I guess. He was worried that I would have gone crazy alone, so he was thankful you had asked me to come along. He also said that he was detrimentally unaware of my friendship with you, and found what happened particularly curious given the traditional definitions of the word 'platonic.' Said something about how Vulcans are typically monogamous and heterosexual, but he understands that Terrans are not Vulcans. Something about being open to spontaneous sexual wiggle room and multiple interpretations of polyamory, blah blah blah.”

"What, you mean 'when in Rome?' Is he going to want a piece of 'hot, Sulu-related, bodice-ripping action' in hopes of better understanding what you see in me?"

She snorts, pinching the bridge of her nose and playing with the leftovers of her salad, "I wouldn't quite go that far. The likelihood of him seeking 'hot Sulu action' is pretty low, statistically, although I’d gladly pay the half of the salary I wasn’t going to pay you for swashbuckling to see the train wreck of you and Spock awkwardly reenacting an romance novel together.”

“Should I be flattered by that?” he asks. Spock’s pretty much Spock, and while Hikaru likes the guy enough, it’s hard to fathom seeing him naked. He also can’t imagine watching Spock fuck, has given it a bit of thought but seems to get doe-eyed and distracted imagining how Nyota’s gorgeous when she comes, shoved up against all of that Vulcan control.

It’s not like Hikaru hasn’t imagined seeing more of Nyota’s gorgeous and contorted body trapped in orgasm from far away as well as up close.

“Look, I think he's curious about this and finds it illogical to get angry because he and I never were exclusive. Chances are he'd feel much differently if you and I did not know each other and I'd just hauled you off the street or picked you up in a club. Or if there’d been history between Spock and I beyond kisses here and there."

"‘Kisses here and there,’ right. You know one day you’re going to have to be honest with me about him. It’s not like I’m the jealous type," he says, watching as she rolls her eyes. "Does this mean I'm your wingman, too? Because, you know, we both agreed we'd be shit at going on pulls. It’d be ‘every man for himself’ within twenty minutes."

"Well, when you’re right, you’re right, but wingmen can do other things, too," she insists. "We also don't have to call it that if you think it's an inaccurate description of our relationship."

"We have a relationship?" he asks. "I thought you didn't want to put a label on it."

"Indulge me, here" she says.

"Wingmen will do just fine," he grins.

"Spock suggested that I give you something as well," she says. "Let me see your hand."

He shrinks back a little, guarding it. "You're not going to stab me, are you?"

She snorts. "No, Hikaru, I'm not going to stab your hand. Besides, half the ship probably thinks you can't feel pain. Didn't you hear that Hikaru Sulu uses pepper sauce instead of face wash?"

"Didn't I tell you explicitly that I didn't want to be a meme?"

"Give me your hand already so I can tell Spock that I delivered his damn message," she says, taking it. She closes his pointer and forefinger together and he watches her two fingers stroke from the palm to his fingertips. It's the kind of caress that's barely there, simple and elegant and intimate in plain sight.

He smiles, knowing what it means even though he doesn't quite believe it and won't until he can run his fingers over the outline of her lips, fit his hands to the small of her back and kiss her the old fashioned way. Still, he's surprised, and tries to parse the depth of meaning in the movement for a second before pausing, realizing there's something even better he can do.

Remembering Portland, Hikaru returns the gesture without thinking, slipping his fingers over the long column of hers. He watches as the smile spreads over her face, and she curls her fingers to interlock around his, until it’s two fists twined together. Her thumb caresses at the back of his hand, and it feels like it always has: like them. This has history, shared misunderstandings and the pain of loss, fond memories constantly rehearsed and replayed. This has San Francisco, and Gaila’s grinning face, and it’s steady and comfortable and loving, even though Hikaru can already tell they’ll never use the word. Still, he holds on tight and can see in her eyes that she needs this as much as he does.

Her eyes sparkle with the promise of ‘later’, and he already knows after shift he’s going to be attempting to rebuild the intimacy of their shared time, piece by piece in the spaces still left bare in his quarters. Her free hand curls around the corner of his face, far more overt. He stares, lowering his mouth to slide a chaste kiss against her palm.

“Always such a smooth operator, Hikaru,” she teases.

“Learned from the best,” he replies.

It’s times like these that he understands the power of small gestures and what they say about the people who make them.

It’s one of the reasons he likes her so much: she understands this power, too.

 

 

 

It's been months since that instant in the canteen, but it feels like days.

The first time he casually curls his tongue around the proper Japanese pronunciation of a polite conjugation required for the translated phrase ‘I’ve been thinking of you’ in a video conversation with his grandmother, her eyes gleam. He can see how proud she is, sees it in her eyes as they threaten to brim with tears, and wishes he could grab her, hugging her close as he says it over and over again.

After he’s done, he curls his tongue around the same syllables in a message to Nyota, imagining fingers that curl into each other, settling into two fists intertwined and the evolution of what has come since the Academy. He smiles, remembering the time where lines and boundaries and disagreements were all they ever really knew of each other. He thinks of how it has given way to laundry left dirty in the curl of her smile.

Pavel’s eyes gleam as Hikaru passes him in the hall. He hears another absurd joke about his badassery in the officer’s commons after Beta Shift as Jim's eyes meet Hikaru's from across the room, shocking blue like lasers. He knows Kirk will be wanting, soon and is already three steps ahead, thinking of all the demerits that Jim's racked up since their last go-round. Jim indulges the newbies they picked up from the last space station in a story of one of their most ridiculous cases of crewmen being poisoned, carefully omitting details of Hikaru running around trying to save Nyota in the name of chivalry.

Half the ship thinks the main export of Hikaru Sulu is pain. It's been about six months, he figures everyone's just going along with it now.

He spars with Spock using old-fashioned epees. Spock's a gentleman about it, and a quick learner. He makes sure to cover the spots Hikaru would normally work to expose, pushes Hikaru to think while others are sloppy and are asking for their ass to be handed to them. Each yield is feral and yet respectful, reserved with heat of all kinds just below the surface.

Nyota’s waiting for him as he returns from the practice rooms, follows him into his quarters and sits off to the side as he undresses, waits as he showers. As he walks back into the room, he can see she's changed as well, her uniform replaced with a colorful robe as she drapes her uniform and boots off to the side.

She’s wearing that bodice from so long ago, he can see the line of it underneath her robe as he steps closer and smiles, fingers crawling around her waist as she undoes the belt and lets him see what she’s been hiding from him, teasing him with for so long.

The heat radiates off her body as she looks at him with lidded eyes and her chest heaves like she's begging him to free her from the garment's confinement. She searches his face and reaches up to capture his lips between hers. The kiss is so chaste it's inhuman and yet so hot it should be against the law. He pushes the fabric of her robe from her shoulders, pressing his mouth against her collarbone. She moans quietly at the contact, and the sound tears through him like electricity.

The room seems on the verge of running out of air.

“What’d I do to deserve this?” he asks.

She shrugs. “I figured it was time for me to start being particular with you.”

“I’m glad,” He says. He means to say 'I love you', but knows this goes beyond that, manifested between all these moments of expansion and contraction over the years. He can hear it in the cadence of his voice, careful and fragile, direct. He doesn't need the words, he never needed the words.

“I know,” she says, softly. He knows she's saying it, too.

He’s sort of glad they don’t even have to say it. It’s their style: words left unspoken and yet always known between them, languages encoded in eyes and hands, the small favors they do for one another.

Even though he's careful with the material, the bodice rips easily and reveals teases of skin just below her breasts. Her head falls backward, revealing her neck in offering as her nails dig into the crease of his back, intertwined with him against the wall.

When he touches her, she touches back.

 

 

 

That night, he dreams of Gaila curled up against him as they watch yet another idiotic romantic comedy from the 2090s, on the couch he’d had back in San Francisco. The popcorn they’re passing back and forth is stale on his tongue, a welcome punctuation on the memory. He likes to throw it at the TV whenever the hero gets absurdly sappy and his love interest gets gooey eyed.

“Do you ever wonder why you watch these with me?” She asks, suddenly.

“Well, mostly because it’s my apartment,” he says. “What are you getting at?"

She shakes her head, grinning lopsidedly at him. “Oh, come on, you know it’s something other than that. I think you like the idea of being one of these guys. Getting what you want in the end.”

“Life has never worked like that,” he says.

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” she says. “These stories wouldn’t be so popular and withstand so much time if they didn’t have some ounce of truth to them.”

“You know that’s incredibly naïve, right?” he asks.

“You’re such an annoyance sometimes,” she says, picking up popcorn and throwing it at him. “I think you’re so much of a romantic you wouldn’t even know what to do with yourself if the right person came your way. Sure, it wouldn’t be nearly as easy as these movies make it out to be, but I think everyone, after a while, wants to be the hero in their own love story, if these movies have any ring of truth to them.”

“You have watched far too many of these,” he points out. “Love’s far too dysfunctional to work like this, and we both know it.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not true,” she singsongs. “You know you’d be a big sap if everything worked out like it would in one of these movies and this happened to you, dysfunctional as it could be.”

On screen, the hero is finally getting the chance to kiss his love, after years of being apart. The orchestral soundtrack swells, the leaves sweep up around them, time stops as the camera dances around the pair. Hikaru looks on, not bitter but amused and maybe annoyed, but wistful over the prospect of something more gradual taking hold. Friends into lovers, lovers into something else. The thought is electrifying, brings a smile over his face.

“See,” she says, pointing at him. “You’re thinking about it right now, sweetheart. Admit it, everybody wants some kind of self-preservation and some kind of love, no matter how dysfunctional those things are.”

“When did you become so prolific?” he teases.

“Somewhere between ‘Pretty Woman’ and ‘Pirates 14, Stagnetti’s Ghost.'”

“You’re aware one of those isn’t actually romantic or a comedy, right?” he says.

“After a while they all start to blur together,” She says. “You Terrans are predictable.”

“How much porn have you been watching?” he asks, incredulously.

She shoves him in response, putting her head on his shoulder. "Just you watch. They'll align for you, Sulu. The stars align for everyone, once or twice."

The sweetness of the memory fades again into black, dotted with twisted metal and endless silence, ships breaking apart and lungs collapsing as they run out of air.

He startles awake.

Nyota’s lying next to him, locked up in his embrace as she sleeps. He stays still, watching the rhythmic movement of her breath as she rearranges herself next to him, revealing wrists still marked with the restraints they used tonight as well as fingernails he knows she didn’t paint herself. Her fingers are reaching out, two of them together as she curls down his bicep, Vulcan kisses everywhere like body worship the way he imagines Spock doing it. The touch is light and teasing, like she’s exploring another part of him in her sleep, even though he should be mind-numbingly familiar.

He knows he shouldn't like her touch like this, but it soothes him, leaves him peaceful. He'll argue with her for a lot of things, but he won't argue over a good night's sleep in her arms. His breath strives to match the rise and fall of her chest as he rests his forehead against hers.

Before he fades back into sleep, Hikaru wonders how the stars aligned for him like Gaila'd said. Or perhaps, as she'd told him those words about love, Gaila had known from experience that she was right.

He wishes he could tell her just how right she was.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Beryllium (or Riding High on Love's True Blueish Light)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/243801) by [hegemony](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hegemony/pseuds/hegemony)




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